07.12.

2011

PRODUCTION AND OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

GIFFORD HOSPITAL PHARMACY CASE STUDY

Submitted by,

GROUP 1

PROCESS FLOW CHART

DETAILS OF METHOD

Receive prescription (0.2 min) Verify and validate prescription (1.9 min) Check for duplicate prescription Check patients allergic reaction history Establish if drugs are in stock Check if drugs are expired Include & attach proper labels (4.5 min) Store prescription (1 min) Prepare charges Close patients pharmacy record (2 min) (1 min) (1.4min)

Operation Movement Inspection Delay Storage

ALTERNATE PROCESS FLOW CHART

DETAILS OF METHOD

Receive prescription (0.2 min) Check for duplicate prescription (2 min) Verify and validate prescription Check patients allergic reaction history (0.6 min) Include & attach proper labels (4.5 min) Store prescription (1 min) Prepare charges Close patients pharmacy record (2 min)

ADVANTAGES: It saves on time by excluding the unnecessary activities in the assembly line. It increases efficiency because all the 5 pharmacists on duty are working Since the checking for duplicate prescriptions are done along with the verification We suggest that checking the stock and expiry date of drugs should be done

simultaneously on 5 different prescriptions. and validation, the entire activity saves around 0.7 mins. separately on a weekly basis in order to avoid wastage of time during the process. DISADVANTAGES: As the entire process is an assembly line process(back to back activity), only after completing one step can we begin the next step. So here the bottle-necking activity is including and attaching proper labels to bottles which consumes 4.5 mins and the time consumed on this activity cannot be reduced. As a result the next activity which is storing the prescriptions becomes the starving activity.

LABOR UTILIZATION: It takes 12 mins to complete the entire process by a single worker. If 5 pharmacists work simultaneously, 5 prescriptions can be completed at a time. Hence in an hour only 25 prescriptions can be completed. But the desired amount of prescriptions to be completed is 32. Therefore, Labour utilization = Actual output/desired output = 25/32 = 78.125%

FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS: To achieve the pharmacys desired output, we recommend more pharmacists to be appointed so that more number of prescriptions can be covered within a stipulated time.