Hospital Buys New Equipment With Saving Money In Mind

A new piece of equipment headed to Stephens County Hospital should help save money for the hospital’s bottom line for years to come.

On Monday, the Stephens County Hospital Authority approved the purchase of an arterial blood gas machine.

Stephens County Hospital Administrator Lynne Anderson said this is a testing device that the hospital will be purchasing.

“When patients come in, they sometimes need to have their blood gas analyzed,” said Anderson. “That is an arterial stick. They do a blood draw like they normally do, but rather than send it to the lab to be resulted, they can do it in a machine at the bedside.”

Anderson said results will be ready and available for the physician in a shorter amount of time and overall, she says the hospital feels it will be a better system.

She went on to say that the hospital plans to see significant savings from this one-time purchase.

“We will have an initial outlay of $29,000 to get the new equipment,” said Anderson. “When you look at the operating costs that go along with the new equipment, it will reduce our costs so we will actually recognize an annual savings of $63,000 a year once we get the new equipment in place,” said Anderson.

Anderson said that savings is the result of several factors.

“A lot of it is because they do it right there at the bedside, whereas before they would send it to our lab to be done,” said Anderson. “That is one thing. The service on the new equipment is less. It also allows to do additional tests right there at that time where we will get additional revenue for it and it will allow us to have some savings with some other equipment that is related to it in the laboratory, so we felt like it was a really good deal and improved patient care as well.”

The Stephens County Hospital Authority approved the purchase unanimously.