Pharmaceuticals is a rapidly changing industry with evolving needs for effective asset management. Keeping in mind the crucial work it is responsible for, it is necessary to ensure error-free service delivery, and efficient resource management for quality patient care.
Staying abreast of these changes and trends helps the industry stay competitive. But the industry is not so easy to operate in! Pharmaceutical companies face a myriad of challenges with regard to asset management and tracking. Implementing asset tracking systems is one of the several ways operations managers can better handle their assets, and implement robust asset control.
This blog takes you through the top challenges faced by the pharmaceutical industry, and the ways asset management systems can help overcome them.
What is pharmaceutical asset management?
The term medical asset management is rigorously used by the pharmaceutical industry. It refers to systematically managing medical equipment, drugs and other resources throughout their life for improved operations. Some examples of pharmaceutical assets include medicines, manufacturing equipment, and laboratory resources.
The goal of smart pharmaceutical asset management is to ensure that these assets function at their best capacity and their lifecycle is regularly tracked to ensure consistent performance. This process includes a variety of aspects, like:
- Asset and inventory management
- Location tracking
- Regular maintenance
- Regulatory compliance
- Vendor management
The industry is always under the public eye due to its direct impact on human lives. So, implementing a well-functioning system for enhanced asset management helps streamline its operations and optimize resource use.
Biggest challenges faced by the pharmaceutical industry today
The pharmaceutical asset management market was valued at $100 billion in 2023, and is expected to reach a whopping $150 billion during the forecast period of 2024-2030, with an estimated CAGR of 5.96%. Despite the changes, some gaps in the pharmaceutical industry remain consistent which pose challenges to its growth, including:
1. Manual data entry
Although there have been significant improvements in the technological landscape of asset management, several companies still rely on outdated methods for asset tracking. This includes using spreadsheets to record new assets or manually entering asset checkin/ checkout details.
These practices are not only inefficient, but also prone to incorrect data input, human errors and duplicate and missing entries. For instance, duplicate data entries alone can complicate the data entry process and lead to incorrect asset and inventory counts.
Manual recording also makes it difficult for employees to quickly retrieve data when needed. Like an employee would need to check the manual records extensively to check if there are enough refrigerators available to store the extra inventory of temperature-sensitive medicine. Imagine how much time a single search would take!
Not only this, but there is likely to be inconsistency in the recorded data as different individuals might be entering the details. This can cause confusion and lead to inaccurate data records – impacting the overall data analysis. All these inconsistencies gradually accumulate overtime, negatively impacting the overall decision-making.
2. Inefficient location tracking
Difficulties in tracking essential equipment can slow down research and development of pharmaceuticals. Inaccurate tracking makes it challenging to assess if sufficient equipment is available for use or not for operational purposes.
Without tracking the location of assets, pharmaceutical companies are at risk of jeopardizing their daily activities that require immediate attention. For instance, an operations manager would need to know if extra lab testing equipment is available at the New York Testing Center to conduct immediate medicine trials. Without a system in place, the manager cannot remotely assess the equipment’s availability unless a physical check is conducted. This can significantly waste their precious time!
3. Non-standard barcode labels
Similar equipment and drugs need to be labeled in a likewise fashion to avoid discrepancies. Easily identifiable labels make it easier for the staff to identify the category of each equipment. Like, similar test tubes can be labeled with the same barcodes but with different unique identifiers.
Pharmaceutical companies often face challenges when they create non-standard labels for their assets. Such labels create administrative issues – not all barcode scanners are compatible with the various barcode designs so they will simply not be able to capture the data encoded in the barcode. These inaccuracies in data easily translate into inaccurate, unusable records and require staff to enter data manually.
Additionally, inaccurate barcodes can also create delays in asset tracking and verification, slowing down operations. Users cannot verify the custody of sensitive assets, so it becomes challenging to track down an asset’s owner.
Effective asset tagging is necessary to make asset and inventory tracking smooth and easier for the staff. Pharmaceuticals is a competitive market where room for errors is low! Saving time and effort in something as small as barcode scanning can ensure sustainability in the longer run.
4. Data vulnerability
Two of the biggest causes of financial losses faced by pharmaceutical companies are security breaches and data loss. According to a report, the primary reasons for data breaches include cyber attacks (45%), human error (28%), and IT failure (27%). Online attackers are always on the lookout for compromised pharmaceutical credentials to launch attacks. This is especially common when pharmaceutical companies use public cloud systems which are more prone to attacks than private clouds. Unauthorized access to asset management systems can also lead to breaches. Notorious staff can misuse the data for theft and leaking sensitive information about expensive equipment.
For instance, someone can change the location of critical inventory items leading to misinformation and operational disruptions if the cloud or the account where the data is stored are easily accessible.
Such data vulnerability can lead to data tampering and inaccuracies in records.
Not only this, but failure to protect data adequately can lead to non-compliance with regulations such as HIPAA, GDPR, and industry-specific standards, resulting in fines and legal consequences. So, lack of data protection on pharma companies’ end can have serious repercussions on their efficiency.
5. Inability to track expiration dates
In the pharmaceutical industry, failure to keep track of expiration dates can be catastrophic. Manual systems are inept at tracking product specifications; staff can fail to update expiration dates of all solutions and medicines on time. They can mistakenly often check out an asset – like a solution for a medicine – without knowing whether it has expired or not. Considering how vast and critical pharmaceutical inventories are, manually tracking expiration dates are bound to lead to errors.
Consequently, expired chemicals going into drug production can lead to wrong chemical formulation, resulting in the production of hazardous drugs. It’s even worse if the drugs in question are still in the research process, leading to skewed results and wastage of several thousands of dollars on R&D.
This leads to a domino effect: inaccurate expiration dates lead to the production of harmful medicines and endanger human lives.
6. Excess costs
Inability to regularly assess costs can be misleading for pharma companies. It can lead to excessive costs at times, causing unnecessary purchases, making it difficult to keep a track of the exact expense.
Pharmaceuticals is a complex industry with frequent inflow and outflow of items. For instance, companies receive highly sensitive components to create drugs, and machinery for the production process. Such intricate operations require sufficient backup inventory. Tracking costs of such inventory can be difficult if done manually. Managers can lose count of inventory items and associated costs if not recorded on time – hampering inventory control and cost control.
Additionally, inefficient asset lifecycle management can also pose financial challenges for pharma companies. Without a system, there is no way for operations managers to know when an asset was procured, what its current depreciation is and what are the number of useful life years remaining. They can end up procuring new equipment – when the current equipment is fully functional – adding to the company’s fixed costs, and vice versa.
7. Lack of access control
With conventional systems, anyone at a pharmaceutical company can view all assets, even ones that have nothing to do with them. They can easily check anything in or out, or worse, they can simply walk away with them without anyone knowing. This can increase the frequency of asset theft, and create the need to procure expensive equipment.
In addition to this, all staff members can have access to fragmented and unnecessary information that is irrelevant to their operations. This can create confusions and cause inaccurate asset checkouts.
For example, it doesn’t make sense for a member of the data analyst team to be able to view and potentially checkout a highly corrosive and sensitive chemical used for testing in the pharmaceutical industry.
Such cases call for a need to restrict what certain members can and cannot view and checkout.
Ways to address pharmaceutical industry problems
Smooth and timely adoption of advanced medical asset management solution helps pharmaceutical companies better manage their assets and inventory. It is one of the most viable ways to quickly address their asset needs and achieve workplace efficiency. Leveraging robust technology, pharmaceutical companies can expedite their research and innovation processes while utilizing assets to their fullest potential.
Here are some solutions to problems faced by the pharmaceutical industry:
1. Centralize data management
By creating an asset register, companies can store essential asset information in one place. This includes entering details like asset name, unique identification number, procurement date, expiration date, in case of a perishable item, and depreciation.
This central database serves as a repository enabling companies to access basic information about assets from one place. Operations managers can track all assets’ financial and non-financial information and monitor their location in real-time. Automating data centralization enables companies to maintain comprehensive records while providing updates on asset location, status and usage.
2. Track asset lifecycle
Effective lifecycle tracking helps companies make timely decisions regarding asset use and allocation. Managers can see what assets are nearing the end of their lifecycle to make decisions about procuring new equipment. For instance, if a medicine filling machine has a broken lever that cannot be replaced, a manager can decide to replace the machine with a new one.
A medical asset management solution tracks asset depreciation so managers can assess how much time an asset can last. It helps companies decide what critical assets have experienced extensive wear and tear and can be replaced or disposed off for smoother operations.
3. Send alerts to staff
Operations managers can set alerts to be sent to staff every time an asset is checked out/in to keep them updated. This includes scheduling alerts on daily, monthly, or quarterly basis so relevant staff members can be kept informed of all asset actions.
Automated alerts can be sent to different users based on their role in the company to avoid email overload for others. So, you can customize alerts to send them only to the relevant personnel. Likewise, you can set thresholds for stock, and send notifications to staff when stock falls below a certain number. This encourages the staff to respond urgently by procuring new stock.
4. Restrict access and control
Maintaining confidentiality of pharmaceutical assets and staff is the top priority of every pharma company. By using advanced access control capabilities of medical asset management solutions, staff can ensure that only the authorized personnel have access to sensitive data. Users can be assigned roles and those roles can be given access to specific information stored in the system. For instance, the technical lab team only views assets relevant to them and not the assets pertaining to the quality assurance team.
This way staff is able to maintain the integrity of data and prevent data tampering. Moreover, managers can gain greater control by ensuring that restricted members never check out assets that are not authorized to them. This consequently results in a decrease in misuse and loss of assets as well.
5. Conduct audits
Staying compliant with internationally set standards for the pharmaceutical industry is necessary to operate successfully in the market. Several ISO standards are applicable on pharma companies – the aim is to ensure safety of pharma products and minimize risks from the production to the distribution process.
Non-compliance can be addressed by assessing the gaps in companies’ performance through internal audits. Managers can quickly assess what assets are overstocked or not performing up to the mark by flagging them during the audit. They can highlight if international standards set by FDA, HIPPA and ISO are being met with regards to asset management and drug production. Also, audits can help verify if maintenance logs have been maintained to achieve asset management compliance.
Solving problems in the pharmaceutical industry with advanced asset management solutions
Dealing with all the above-mentioned challenges in the pharmaceutical industry on your own can be a grueling task, especially when you track assets manually. However, shifting to cloud based platforms for inventory management and asset tracking, like EZOfficeInventory, can do wonders for you!
The platform enables you to track, and monitor assets while ensuring the assets are maintained in the best possible shape. You can print standard labels for your chemicals, track their movements easily and control who gets to check them out. By taking simple yet important actions using the system, pharmaceutical companies can simplify their operations and efficiently control costs.
