Medical Equipment Management Plan: I Purpose
Medical Equipment Management Plan: I Purpose
Medical Equipment Management Plan: I Purpose
EC.02.04.01 (2009)
EC.02.04.03 (2009)
I PURPOSE
The mission of MCG Health, Inc. (MCGHI) is to improve the health of the people of the State
of Georgia, Richmond County and the City of Augusta by providing cost-effective, quality
health and hospital services. Consistent with this mission, the Board of Directors, medical
staff, and administration have established and provided ongoing support for the Medical
Equipment Program described in this plan.
The purpose of the Medical Equipment Management Plan is to define the program to
manage medical equipment maintenance and safety for patients, visitors, and staff.
II SCOPE
The Biomedical Engineering Department operates between 8:00 am and 5:00 pm with
onsite coverage by staff. Biomedical Engineering staff is available on a 24/7 basis by using
a formal on call program. Services provided include, but were not limited to: Medical
Equipment inventory, Equipment Acquisition, Selection of new equipment, Incoming
Medical Equipment inspections, Planned Maintenance, Equipment repair, assistance with
Hazard Notifications and Recalls, Documenting user errors, and providing incidental
operator training.
III FUNDAMENTALS
A. Equipment Inventory
The purpose of this policy is to (1) outline components of the medical equipment
management program (MEMP) administered by the Biomedical Engineering
Department, and (2) to define criteria as well as a risk based assessment process to
be used in the development of strategy on how best to define, track and inspect
equipment to be included within the program. The risk based assessment is also used
to assign initial scheduled maintenance frequencies for a select grouping of devices
within the program. Initially proposed equipment inspection frequencies using the
criteria should be considered a baseline assessment in the initial development of
inspection schedules. These schedules are subject to change based upon the
following: equipment type; risk to patient should equipment fail; equipment utilization
factors; event history and scheduled maintenance procedures.
Not all patient care devices listed within the Biomedical Engineering Department
Asset Inventory
Medical Equipment
Inventory
Scheduled Inspections
(MME)
3 NPM – No PM required. Items in this category have a very low risk to the
patient or staff when they fail, which are repaired only when reported as
defective.
Equipment that is typically (more than 50% of the time) used in life support will have a
life support priority group. Equipment in this priority group is included in the MEMP
and initially tested for safety and operational performance one or more times/year.
This equipment is given the highest priority for testing, calibration, and repair. One
Hundred percent (100%) of devices defined as Life Support should have current PM
status. (Target: PM completed within 90 days of date issued) *
Items currently risk ranked as Life Support equipment follow:
* NOTE: Devices which are not located or made available for scheduled maintenance
within their scheduled inspection timeframes will be defined as overdue for testing, and
will remain overdue until documented efforts have been made to locate the specific
device, with maintenance performed as soon as the device can be made available. If
the device cannot be located within four months of the scheduled date, the inspection
work order will be closed out and defined as ‘could not locate.’ Devices not located or
validated to be in active use for a 12 month period will be removed from the active
inventory and no longer scheduled for inspection.
All of the included equipment is provided with a durable tag carrying a unique
Biomedical Equipment Control (BEC) number.
Rented equipment, loaned equipment, including that provided for demonstrations, and
staff-owned equipment, are all considered for inclusion in the program.
C. Equipment Acquisition
The facility has a formal process for acquiring new capital equipment (defined as items
valued at $5,000 or more). This process requires that a formal requisition be
generated and that this requisition be evaluated and considered for approval by the
Capital Budget Committee which makes a judgment on the appropriateness of the
equipment with respect to the clinical services provided by the institution. The
Committee requests support from experts in certain specialized areas when it deems
this additional support necessary.
E. Incoming Inspections
All patient care equipment, whether owned, leased or rented is tested for compliance
with previously specified minimum safety and/or performance standards before being
used for the first time for patient care. The results of this testing are documented and
the records are filed on-site in the Biomedical Engineering Department. Similarly,
equipment that has been withdrawn from use and placed in storage is also tested to
these standards before being returned to service.
F. Planned Maintenance
All of the equipment listed in the facility’s Maintenance Monitored Equipment (MME)
Inventory is subjected to a carefully controlled regimen of performance assurance and
safety testing and scheduled maintenance. This mix of procedures is generally
referred to throughout this document as planned maintenance (PM).
PM = SM + PA + ST
The procedures and intervals for the scheduled maintenance (SM) are initially
determined using risk level or manufacturer’s specifications and modified based on
local experience. The procedures for the performance assurance (PA) and safety
testing (ST) have been developed by either the Director of Biomedical Engineering or,
in some cases, other service providers. They are based on both the manufacturer’s
published performance specifications and current, nationally recognized safety
standards.
Although the planned maintenance is usually completed on time (within 63 days of the
issue date of the computer generated work order), the computerized documentation
system includes an exception-reporting feature, which prompts the staff to investigate
any incomplete work orders. The primary documentation of the planned maintenance
consists of service reports that are kept in electronic form and/or in individual file
folders (old history) on-site (one folder for each piece of equipment) and for work
performed after July 2007 the primary documentation is electronic and held in our
Computerized Medical Maintenance System (CMMS). Computerized summaries of
the maintenance work are also available and are used to provide regular status reports
to the Department Managers and the Environment of Care/Safety Committee.
The individual making the service call fills out a red DNU “Do Not Use…” tag, if
available, noting the time that the service call was made on the tag, and attaches the
In the case of repair requests that are handled by Biomedical Engineering personnel,
the service event is given a special coding if the call can be attributed to a user error,
rather than and equipment malfunction. If it can be confirmed that the user is
Responsibility for coordinating and implementing the education and training of the
equipment users is held jointly by the facility’s Education Department, the Medical
Director and the department managers. The most common sources of training on
specific equipment are the manufacturer’s initial in-services, the manufacturer’s
refresher in-services, the equipment user instruction manual or other audio-visual
equivalents, and other staff who have been trained on the proper use of the
equipment. Biomedical Engineering technical staff assists in this process whenever
they are competent to do so, and on an as-requested basis. Where a specific problem
is identified as a result of a service call, Biomedical Engineering staff provides an
incidental inservice, usually limited to correcting the user-related problem identified at
the time of the service call.
Events within the facility in which someone is injured, or could have been injured, are
reported to the facility’s Risk Manager. In situations where an item of equipment is
directly involved, or is thought to have been directly involved, the facility has a policy
that the equipment be removed from service and impounded with as little disturbance
as possible to the settings and other evidence that might aid the investigation.
Biomedical Engineering staff act as a resource to the facility and, on request, assists
with investigating the circumstances of the incident, or in arranging for others to
investigate the incident. Determination of whether or not the incident is reportable
pursuant to the Safe Medical Devices Act of 1990 remains with the facility MCGHI
Legal or Risk Management Department.
M. Equipment-Related Emergencies
IV. OBJECTIVES
A. Performance Improvement
These questions, and other applicable considerations, are addressed in the Annual
Program Effectiveness Assessment and Performance Improvement Report. At the
time when the Annual Assessment is prepared, areas of weakness that are
considered to need improvement are targeted as goals for the following year.
Progress with respect to these goals is reported in the quarterly Performance
Improvement Report to the facility’s quality management committee or quality council
Safety Committee.
Based on the last formal assessment, the facility has established the following
specific goals for FY 2010:
PI Goal #1: Reduce the average level of “unable to locate for PM” items to below 5%.
PI Goal #2: Increase the % of incidental inservices to above 50% for repairs
designated as use errors when specific users can be associated with the
equipment being evaluated.
PI Goal #3: Develop the tools to measure baseline response time to urgent or STAT
repair requests. In order to use the PDCA process to improve on our
response time to urgent or STAT repair requests.
PI Goal #4: Maintain a quarterly PM completion rate for life support equipment of
100%.
PI Goal #5: Maintain a quarterly PM completion rate for non-life support equipment of
95%.
B. Information Management
There is CMMS computer system that maintains records on all equipment on the
Biomedical Engineering inventory. This system has electronic records related to the
repair and maintenance of all equipment. A paper file exists which hold paper copies
of old history on older equipment. A Quarterly Report documenting the nature of any
user-related equipment problems or operator-error trends, equipment failures during
patient use, and status of planned maintenance (PM) completion rates, is provided to
the Safety Committee.
MCG Health
Medical Equipment Emergency Procedures
Large volume Infusion Obtain replacement pump Switch to manual drip until pump Clean supply room Biomedical Engineering (1-
Pump arrives if required 2228)
Intra-Aortic Balloon Request back up unit Utilize pharmacologic support to ?? Biomedical Eng (1-2228) or
Pump optimize patient’s preload, contractility Switchboard after hours
and after load
The numerical value assigned to the device’s Function (F) factor is determined by which of the following
three classes best describe the device’s usual function.
3 Devices whose function is to support items that are used in direct patient
care in the clinical environment (e.g. battery chargers and printers).
1 Equipment which is not used for direct patient care (e.g. televisions).
The numerical value assigned to the device’s Application (A) factor is determined by which of the
following three classes’ best describe the physical risks associated with the device’s usual clinical
application.
10 Equipment that is typically (more than 50% of the time) used intended to
sustain life.
The numerical value assigned to the device’s Maintenance Requirements (M) factor is determined by
which of the following three classes best describe the device’s generally known or manufacturer-specified
level of maintenance requirements.
The numerical value assigned after analysis of the device’s Equipment History (EH).
-3 Less than 5% of PM work order noted a problem hidden from the user of the
device (e.g. device out of calibration)
0 Device has been tracked for problems hidden from the user for less than 1 year,
or between 5% and 10%
3 More than 10% of PM work order noted a problem hidden from the user of the
device (e.g. device out of calibration)
The RC number = F+A+M+EH. It is used to quantify the priority level that should be given to the
maintenance monitoring of Medical Equipment in the program.
Equipment with a RC number >18 are classified as Priority Level 1. Level 1 items will be
considered life support equipment as defined by The Joint Commission.
File Name: MEMP After Hours or Emergency Prepared by: Michael Landis
Service Call Procedure 001.doc
If the need arises for a piece of medical equipment to be repaired on an emergency basis after hours, on a weekend
or holiday, the clinical user shall call the hospital dispatch.
Hospital dispatch will contact Biomedical Engineering Department on-call pager. On-call
Biomedical technician will respond within 30 mins. Escalation process will be initiated if
response exceeds 30 Min.
The individual making the service call fills out a red DNU “Do Not Use…” tag, noting
the time that the service call was made on the tag, and attaches the tag to the
defective equipment item (If no red DNU tag is available, a legible note will suffice).
Biomedical Engineering is available in house from 8:00am to 5:00pm (M-F)by calling
1-2228. Biomedical Engineering is also available for emergency repair service 24
hours a day, 7 days a week by calling 1-8400, asking for the switchboard operator to
page the Biomedical Engineering Technician On-Call, for the repair of equipment
which is reasonably necessary in order for customer to continue to effectively deliver a
vital clinical service, and for which an adequate temporary alternative is not available.
When repair services are needed, customer shall promptly notify Biomedical
Engineering staff and allow full access to equipment.
Approved ___________________________________________________________________________
Richard Tobias, VP Facilities Services Date
MCG Health, Inc.