Assessment of Supply Chain Management Resilience within Saudi Medical Laboratories during Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Covid-19 pandemic has affected global supply chains disrupting local inventory management. Multiple studies have shed light on the scarcity of personal protective equipment. Still, not much data was seen on how this crisis resulted in the disruption of other health care sectors. This paper studies how this crisis affected supply chains and inventory management on the laboratory commodities during the Covid-19 pandemic within Saudi Arabia. A cross-sectional qualitative study targeting laboratory personals and suppliers in Saudi Arabia is conducted to evaluate laboratory material inventory management. Our sample includes twelve hospitals and ten suppliers.The study revealed that the supply chain functions resilience was moderate to mildly affected during the pandemic. The higher effect in the supply chain functions was in the lead time (58%), followed by purchasing (33%), then the inventory (25 %). The actual lab supply was significantly affected in 2 hospitals only, moderately affected in 7 hospitals (58%), and mildly affected in 2 hospitals. The unavailability of reagents was the highest result of the disruption (50%) besides the price change and lack of alternatives. Almost (86 %) of suppliers reported that their service was partially affected in most supply chain functions although they claimed having reasonable resilience measures/processes to sustain their operations. The highest risk mitigation process were the backup supply, recovery plan, and emergency/disaster agreements coverage. Most than half of the organizations reported that they have mature resilience measures. This leads us to conclude that both laboratory and supplier inventory and supply chain management had reasonable resilience processes in Saudi Arabia. Those measures were clear in minimizing the disruption effects caused by the pandemic and having a moderate impact on the laboratory operations.