For a 271-bed hospital, optimizing their IV Start Kit was the main objective to decrease waste, maintain patient quality, and capture utilization cost savings. By turning to Blue.Point and leveraging the IV Start Kit study, it became apparent to the hospital their custom IV Start Kits contained several components with clinical features not used for most patients and came with a higher price point than comparative products. Internal discussions revealed the intention of the identified product was to ensure longer duration IVs were maintained until clinically indicated for removal; specifically for inpatient use. Blue.Point data showed that the feature-rich kit demonstrated product creep and was used throughout the outpatient areas.

The hospital’s Vascular Access Nurse Leader identified departments that did not fully benefit from using the feature-rich IV Start Kit. To initiate change, Supply chain facilitated conversations between the preferred manufacturer and subject matter experts (SME) which included Supply chain, Nursing Leaders, Performance Improvement, Quality Specialist, and Vascular Specialist to determine an appropriate standard IV Start Kit. The team established a timeline to begin the product transition for identified departments. Once the transition to standard IV Start Kits was complete for selected departments, savings began to track, and post-conversion staff survey were scheduled.

Following Blue.Point’s action plan, in one year, the hospital realized savings of $221,047.

Blue.Point solutions revealed:

- Product creep of feature-rich IV Start kit to the outpatient areas

- Project must be spear-headed by facility SME

- Identified changes supported by unbiased clinical research

If you want to learn more about utilization and how Blue.Point can identify savings opportunities, please reach out to info@bluepointscs.com.