Automated management of mdical istrumentation and services

Biomedical/clinical engineering departments are responsible for the cost effective management of medical instrumentation beginning with the initial considerations to purchase a device, and continuing through to its eventual replacement. In order to facilitate the acquisition of equipment, and their preventive maintenance, as well as an efficient utilization of the human resources, an automated general purpose system was implemented. The developed Maintenance Management Program is written in Clipper. It consists of 16 databases, 19 index files, plus the PM.EXE, which is an executable file, compiled from a combination of 211 files. The program allows management of scheduled and nonscheduled equipment maintenance, management of equipment or departmental status report, keeping track of employee database, and management of parts and vendor database. Specifically, the Maintenance Management Program consists of five modules: Preventive Maintenance, Work Order, Parts, Employee, Utility. The Equipment Maintenance Management Program, implemented in a PC environment, should meet the needs of biomedical/clinical engineering department in a small and medium size hospital.