By Healthcare Facilities Today

According to an article on the Outpatient Surgery website, most healthcare facility managers will only send broken equipment to the original manufacturer to be fixed if their company can't handle the repair or if equipment came with a repair contract as part of the lease.

When a piece of OR equipment breaks down and is in need of repair, the options are:

• Send it to the original equipment manufacturer

• Send it to a third-party repair facility 

• Or, if there is one, call the in-house biomedical staff. 

Two-thirds of the 40 surgical facility leaders surveyed for the article use some combination of all three 

"Cost and quality are always factors when deciding who repairs what," says Deborah Henning, RN, BSN, CNOR, director of surgical services at J.C. Blair Memorial Hospital in Huntingdon, Pa.

Many view sending equipment to the original manufacturer for repair as something of a last resort, the article said.

"It's usually our last option because of cost," said a hospital instrument room supervisor. "Only when the equipment is under warranty or biomed doesn't perform repairs on that piece," said Casey McFarland, MHA, administrator of the Georgia Endoscopy Center in Alpharetta, Ga. 

Read the article.