Owens & Minor Ensures Regulatory Compliance in over 50 Distribution Centers with a Veriteq Environmental Monitoring System

Owens & Minor, Mechanicsville, VA, is a leading U.S. supplier of medical and surgical products to hospitals, integrated healthcare systems, alternate care locations, and the federal government. The company serves the medical community from 50 plus distribution centers nationwide, providing consumable goods such as disposable gloves, dressings, endoscopic products, needles and syringes, sterile procedure trays, surgical products and gowns, and urological and wound-closure products.

For many of these products, a climate-controlled environment is required to maintain efficacy and meet regulatory guidelines. Prior to upgrading their monitoring capability, Owens & Minor used data loggers to measure and record temperatures. Individuals in each distribution center would manually download the data for review and archive purposes. Owens & Minor recognized the inefficiency of this process and chose to look for a better solution.

The Goal

Along with the company’s internal standards, Owens & Minor meets requirements for archival documentation for the state boards of pharmacy and the FDA. In addition to the goal of increasing efficiency in monitoring and reporting data for compliance, the company wanted to simplify the process of viewing critical data from all locations.

Owens & Minor sought a monitoring system that would eliminate the manual steps in generating reports, send immediate notification if conditions were heading out of accepted limits, and provide an easily accessible way to see what was going on in critical areas.

Four suppliers were evaluated as part of Owens & Minor’s monitoring system bid process. The review process led to the selection of viewLinc™, Veriteq Instrument’s monitoring, alarming and reporting system.

“We selected the viewLinc system because it used standard Internet browser-based software and integrated with our existing WiFi, 802.11 network. In addition, we liked how Veriteq paid attention to detail in matching their solution to our needs,” said Bob Peck, Director of Regulatory Compliance for Owens & Minor.

Alarming

“Initially, we installed the system at one location to gauge its capabilities before deploying nationwide,” says Peck. “The system worked great and now monitors temperature and relative humidity from 423 sensors located within our warehouses, refrigerators, and specialty rooms.”

Using viewLinc, managers at each Owens & Minor site can view critical areas of interest in real time, as well as receive alarm notification via PC, phone or pager. Alarm messages can be sent to different people based upon their areas of responsibility and ability to respond; for example, regulatory personnel receive communications alarms and distribution center personnel receive out-of-limit alarms.

Messages sent by viewLinc describe the location and alarm condition, as well as requirements to acknowledge alarms and comments — with both user-entered and preset descriptions.

All interactions are documented, including for example who acknowledged the alarm and what corrective action was taken, ensuring a detailed audit trail.

Reporting

As in all controlled and regulated environments, reporting is crucial to Owens & Minor. Staff must generate reports that include data, statistics such as Mean Kinetic Temperature (MKT), and events. With viewLinc, reports can be created on demand over a specified time period, or pre-configured and delivered via email automatically on a regular schedule.

“The reporting capability gives us the flexibility to look at any time period, specific monitors, or an entire distribution center.” says Peck.

“We appreciate the fact that viewLinc ensures that our records are continuous. It’s a fact of life that equipment fails — compressor performance degrades, power outages occur, network interruptions happen,” says Peck. The viewLinc system’s loggers operate independently with an internal battery and memory to gather data — regardless of what happens elsewhere. Once the network or power is restored, viewLinc retrieves data from each logger, updating the database from the time before the interruption.

Results

A fully deployed viewLinc system connects all remote locations and users with security permissions. “We now have a much more efficient way to ensure compliance; we have consistent records and easily retrievable archives.” Peck finds it convenient that viewLinc is easily scalable to the changing needs of Owens & Minor. “The system gives us important information that can be used when planning for new or expanded warehouse space,” says Peck.

In conclusion, Peck states, “The viewLinc system offers peace of mind that our products are being stored under the proper conditions. This allows staff to focus more on core responsibilities.” He also expressed thanks to the Veriteq team for their expert support and professionalism, including setup and training on-site and over the web.

To learn more about Veriteq's monitoring and mapping solutions for pharmaceutical warehouses, please contact us online, by email, or by calling 800-683-8374.