MEDICAL SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

Supply Chain Management for Critical Medical items in the Military

Supply Chain Management for Critical Medical items in the Military

Introduction

Supply chain management (SCM) has forever been, a significant feature of any military. Soldiers should have medicine, water, food, and shelter to protract life. Soldiers should have a good means of medicine available just like transporting weapons and a supply of weapons. Since early era, victorious forces generals have been aware of the significance of keeping a medical supply chain to keep their soldiers well.

It is often said that war is the best medical school. The battlefields supplied young, often inexperienced surgeons with what seemed to be an unlimited number of cases. Military physicians were called on to deal with endless cases of camp fevers and dysenteries. While some of the forms met by military physicians and surgeons are irregular to warfare, many of the lessons they learned and the training they obtained in military service were later applied to civilian life. Military medicine underwent many changes and reforms of techniques, organization, and personnel during the nineteenth century in response to experiences gained in the numerous wars fought in Europe and America. This paper discusses the supply chain management for critical medical items in the military.

Thesis

The supply and demand accuracy on critical items for military personnel is very vital during wartime.

Discussion

Commercial supply chain and Military supply chain are elements of the same activity. Both supply chains are related to precision & velocity, focused logistics, fast & flexible distribution, coordinated delivery schedules, and high-quality equipment and infrastructure at allocation hubs. (Kress, 2002)

Military supply chain must ensure the life cycle management of specific medical services and products necessary to carry military healthcare across the series of military functions. These comprise medical equipment & maintenance (with medical repair parts), medical materiel (gases, supplies, assemblages, equipment, ), optical fabrication, blood, medical logistics, and medical facilities management.

A cliché in the discussion of military history is that amateurs argue strategy and professionals discuss logistics. It is certainly clear that no military campaign succeeds if the supply and medical services fail to meet their responsibilities. Unfortunately, there is little glory in hauling supplies, and if battlefield doctors sometimes win recognition as they risk life and limb to reach a wounded man, their many hours devoted to the proper maintenance of latrines and foot care are more likely to draw derision than the praise they deserve. Soldiers, themselves, often despise logistical duties and look down on those who hold them. Even in Prussia, where the general staff system developed during the 19th century, there was a long struggle over the acceptance of staff officers as the equals of line officers. Military historians have tended to follow the same sort of prejudices, and have devoted relatively little attention to logistical matters. (Assey , 2012)

Logistics is the science of preparing, planning, assessing, and executing the maintenance and movement of forces. Line logistics encompasses the following tasks:

Supply.

Field ...