Seeking to improve its inventory control so that its ambulances were always well stocked with the required medical equipment and consumables, South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation turned to Medstor.
Having won the bid to provide materials management solutions for SWASFT via a tender on the Atamis portal, the storage specialist first presented trial proposals and quotations for a small number of ambulance stations, which could then be rolled out across the Trust’s 29 sites. The Medstor team reviewed the Trust’s needs – to replace the shelving and boxes currently being used for storage and generally improve organisation – and developed a solution built around its modular HTM 71 cabinets – as recommended in HTM 71.
Medstor produced a range of full-height cabinets, and modular cabinets were selected for each station, each built around its ‘unique’ tray-and-liner system, which allows a large number of consumables to be stored safely and accessed easily. With the ambulance stations running as normal throughout the upgrade, the Medstor installations team took a systematic approach to the upgrade and refit of the storage areas at each site.
While the cabinets were being fitted, station staff emptied stock from the existing boxes and shelving directly into the Medstor trays, which could then put straight into the Medstor cabinets. This was repeated across the stations as the new materials management solution was rolled out. In all Medstor provided a total of 239 mobile and fixed cabinets fitted with 2,435 trays and liners, all designed and manufactured at its own UK headquarters, ensuring consistency of quality and supply.
SWASFT now has more streamlined, cost-effective storage procedures in 29 of its sites.
Stock levels and use-by dates can be monitored more easily, and ambulances refilled and ready faster.
South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SWASFT) provides ambulance services across an area of 10,000 square miles, from Bath and North Somerset to Cornwall and the Scilly Isles – an area that represents 20% of mainland England. It serves both a population of over 5.5 million, and the 23 million visitors to the region every year. The stations employ nearly 6,000, mainly clinical and operations staff plus GPs, around 600 volunteers, and over 800 students in training.
Medstor says the storage solutions it has supplied to SWASFT are ‘typical of the highly effective products it designs for healthcare facilities throughout the world’. It said: “Every element of each racking system or cabinet has beautifully simple, clean, sleek lines that not only complement the design of the room or building, but also offer increased storage capacity, better cost efficiency through improved stock control, and dramatically enhanced infection control.”
