Integrating Medication Management Automation Into Health Systems

^{By Julie Gould}

Gordon Krass, CEO, IntelliGuard, explains how hospitals systems are struggling with greater operational challenges and highlights how these systems can reduce waste and cut costs by tracking critical medications with a digital paper trail.  

Can you briefly explain how the medical supply chain has been impacted in the wake of COVID-19?

The environment is incredibly challenging, and hospital systems are struggling with even greater operational challenges then they’ve faced pre-COVID. The medical–and particularly the medication supply chain–has seen significant consolidation limiting the number of suppliers. Along with “Just in Time” inventories, any disruption has a ripple effect. In this case, COVID spiked demand for medications such as drugs needed to ventilate a patient. This spike in demand causes significant supply shortages. Hospitals respond by ordering higher quantities of medication which makes the problems even worse.    

Can you discuss IntelliGuard and the benefits of this solution for health systems?

IntelliGuard designs, manufactures and implements intelligent health care supply chain management solutions powered by Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). We focus on enabling health care facilities to improve patient safety and increase revenue by adopting true medication management automation. Our enterprise of cloud-based products enables closed-loop tracking of medications and narcotics throughout the hospital supply chain.

By improving drug inventory transparency and medication replenishment, how does this impact health care outcomes?

Unlike bar codes, RFID tags are automatically read to eliminate human error. IntelliGuard’s RFID provides an immediate and comprehensive survey of all medications within the entire hospital system. With 99.99% accuracy, hospitals and health care providers will always have what they need when they need it, ensuring necessary meds are always available at the point of care. 

Please highlight why it is important to reduce waste and cut costs by tracking critical medications with a digital paper trail for health systems and all parties involved in the patient journey. 

Real-time data, trends and feedback enable customers to optimize medication inventory and supply chain to reduce waste, cut costs, increase charge capture. These solutions also automatically track controlled substance administration and waste events, improving accountability. Digital solutions can track trends and anomalies, enabling customers to potentially spot diversion risks before they occur.

Gordon Krass joined IntelliGuard® in 2017 as the chief executive officer. As CEO, Gordon works with the company’s board of directors and senior leadership team to lead and operationalize overall business strategy and global market expansion goals. He brings more than 25 years of experience with startup and Fortune 500 companies in the medical device and telecommunications industries as both an executive and consultant. Just before joining IntelliGuard®, he spent 4.5 years as president then chief client officer of NobelBiz, a telecommunications and software company. Prior to joining NobelBiz, Gordon spent over 16 years with IVAC Corporation (Alaris Medical/Carefusion), where he served as vice president of marketing and sales, among other positions. Gordon earned a Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) in communication and media studies at Eastern Michigan University.