The Dutch health care system is a large drain on the Dutch national budget and counts for 15.6 percent of the GDP in 2013 (CBS, 2014) (NEVI, 2011). These expenses will increase in the future, because of the increasing percentage of elderly and the new medical procedures probably becoming more expensive and specialized. To keep these expenses in check, the Dutch health care system is going through a lot of new cutbacks and changes aimed at qualitative improvements to maintain the current quality level with a smaller budget.
The Dutch health care system is a large drain on the Dutch national budget. With the Dutch hospitals
costing 20 billion euros yearly. Six billion euros, of the total 20 billion euros are spend on goods and
materials. If a part of these goods are wasted within the health care system, the costs of this system
could be reduced by reducing this waste. This paper has researched the possible waste reduction
possible in health care pathways by researching three health care pathways in Dutch hospitals.
This paper answers the research question: How can the possible wasted disposables be reduced in
health care pathways in Dutch hospitals?
This question is answered with the creation of a framework based on multiple case studies created
from research done in the three health care pathways, Percutaneous Coronary Intervention, Cataract
and Hip Fractures. These health care pathways are visualized using IDEF0 diagrams, and the
disposable flows are shown in matching tables. To provide constructive solutions to possible wasted
disposables within health care pathways in Dutch hospital in general, a framework is constructed. This
framework generalizes health care pathways to four basic steps, diagnostics, pre-operation, operation
and post operation. The main solutions to reduce the chance of wasted disposables within health care
pathways, is to improve the amount of standardization of disposables used and needed, and improve
the communication and collaboration between parties within the health care pathways. These
solutions are based on the case studies and the literature research on the Dutch health care system in
general, Dutch hospitals and the goods logistics within the Dutch health care system. This also
provides an answer to the research question, on how to reduce disposables being wasted in health
care pathways in Dutch hospitals. This thesis research is conducted on three care pathways are
researched in multiple hospitals, but not all Dutch hospitals. Different results could be reached when
researching other health care pathways or different hospitals, but the framework provided in this
paper could be valid for these different situations. Both the validity of this research and the
constructed framework has to be researched in subsequent research studies. These subsequent
research studies have to verify if the conclusions derived in this research is valid for other health care
pathways and if the framework is applicable and if it has achieved its objective.