The Impact of covid 19 on the medicinal supply chain: case of Bindura Provincial hospital

Author

Kanyere, Bianca

Title

The Impact of covid 19 on the medicinal supply chain: case of Bindura Provincial hospital

Abstract

The study sought to assess the impacts of COVID-19 on the supply chain of medicinal supply as a case study of Bindura Provincial Hospital in Bindura, Zimbabwe. This was achieved identifying the effects of covid 19 on medicinal supply chain activities at Bindura provincial hospital and evaluating the strategies put in place by the hospital in curbing the impacts of the shock from the COVID-19 pandemic on supply chain management. The study further proposed possible intervention measures that could be adopted to support sustainable supply chain management during possible health shock in future.
To achieve these research objectives, data was gathered using a mixed method for both quantitative and qualitative data from a sample size of 60 respondents. The study targeted responses from doctors, nurses, hospital management, medical superintend, patients and stores clerk. The data was collected with response rate of 86.7% from a distribution of 52 out of 60 questionnaires administered and 5 interviews were successful. Through the use the descriptive statistics focusing on the mean score and standard deviations produced by Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) application data was presented, analysed and discussed accordingly leading to the conclusions and recommendations. The Cronbach’s Alpha was used to check and validate the content or variables of the research questionnaire checking the internal consistency of the instrument and the result was 0.718 which is greater than 0.70% hence it signified that the reliability was acceptable. From the findings major, the majority were male participants, the most affected departments were clinical and surgery followed by pharmacy. The first two effects recorded were, distortions to typical demand due to changes in customer purchasing behaviour and total revenue losses from cancelled surgeries and other Services. Also, the first two strategies observed were, utilization of technological solution through employing a range of digital and analytics solutions and building redundancy in the supply chain to increase supply chain resiliency. The study also concluded by testing hypothesis using the Chi-square testing between the affirmation that COVID-19 against the effects COVID-19 to medicinal supply chain and the results which showed that there the alpha was 0 (.0%) and there are no cells that have expected frequencies less than 5, which conferred the assumption has not been violated and the study assumption (H0) has been accepted which concludes that there is a positive relationship between the variables hence COVID-19 has resulted in the adverse effects to the Hospital.
Lastly, proposed intervention measure was Revision of regulatory and reimbursement practices to promote the cost-efficient maintenance of inventories at multiple points in the supply chain. The study also recommended There should be zero import duties for pharmaceuticals and medical supplies and equipment encourages the hospitals to effectively acquire the shortages and to increase their supplies.

Date

April 2022

Publisher

BUSE

Keywords

Covid-19

Medicinal supply chain

Public health

Supervisor

Mr Nkala