Just What The Doctor Ordered
Healthcare in-plants face the unique task of serving both the medical field and the patients that are being treated.
In-plants serving the healthcare industry are responsible for more than just paper and ink; it is an industry with a definite human side to it.
"We are dealing with life. We cannot afford to have a lot of mistakes made," explains Margie Penkala, team leader of the graphic arts/mailroom department at St. Helena Hospital, in Deer Park, Calif.
While Penkala oversees just four part-time employees in the hospital in-plant, she understands the large responsibility her department is taking on. "The forms have got to say the right thing because of litigation these days. You have got to make sure the form looks good—that it is clean copy so when they project it up to a screen in a courtroom it looks good and it has accurate information on it," Penkala says.
Marvin Beck, manager of the in-plant at Penn State Geisinger Health System, in Danville, Pa., agrees. He knows that, when dealing with healthcare, the patients come first.
"If a job comes in and it deals directly to patient care, that takes priority over anything," says Beck. "We make sure it gets done." Beck says his employees do an excellent job of keeping up with production demands.
Forms And Marketing Materials
Though all in-plants are different, one job seems to be a constant at healthcare in-plants—forms.
"We do all of the forms that are used in the charts, all the forms used for admitting the patient and the position orders that come down from our medical staff," Penkala says. "The people who have medical offices off campus will fax us pre-orders." St. Helena's in-plant does 98 percent of its forms in-house, she says.
Another job common among healthcare in-plants is advertising and marketing materials. According to Roger Harter, graphic arts manager for the Marshfield Clinic, in Marshfield, Wis., advertising is becoming a large part of the work that his in-plant does.
"Like a lot of other industries, there is a lot of advertising. We have specialties we like to market—heart care is one. We try to develop all of the services involving heart care," says Harter.
At Marshfield Clinic, much of this advertising takes the form of brochures and high-end products to help show patients that its healthcare services—like its printed products—are first rate. Harter notes that the addition of color to these materials has increased dramatically in the past few years.
Ben Taylor, director of printing services for Methodist Healthcare, of Memphis, Tenn., says that in addition to all the forms, brochures, letterhead, envelopes, two-color newsletters and four-color fund-raising materials printed by his in-plant, the shop also prints tray covers for its dietetics department. The in-plant, which is responsible for printing services for 16 hospitals, personalizes forms with 126 variations of logos for different organizations.
In addition to printing work, Penkala and Beck both also head up their organization's mailroom operations. At St. Helena Hospital, Penkala sees a volume of about 10,000 pieces every two weeks, including bulk mail. She is also in charge of keeping the nurses' stations stocked with forms.
For Beck, at Penn State Geisinger, the mailroom has been an on-and-off responsibility throughout the 24 years he has spent at the in-plant. Back under his control since last year, it includes all bulk mail, labeling, invoice inserting and mail scanning at a rate of six million pieces per year.
Beck is now preparing for an upcoming area code change, which will require updating numerous forms and other printed materials.
"We have until April when it will go through," he says. "We have to change all the forms that have telephone numbers by then."
The Effects Of Healthcare Trends
When a new trend hits the healthcare industry, in-plant managers have to adjust. Such trends can drastically increase or, unfortunately, drastically decrease the amount of work sent to the in-plant.
Taylor, of Methodist Healthcare, has seen both extremes. When a new government program was initiated to provide healthcare for low-income people who lack medical insurance, Taylor saw color work get cut back dramatically. With this program, people can sign up for healthcare with certain providers, which lessens the need for advertising materials. This took a lot of work from the in-plant. On the other hand, when Methodist Healthcare later merged with another medical center, Taylor saw the workload increase again.
Cost reduction is a major healthcare trend according to Beck, especially since the inception of managed care. This cost reduction, he says, has brought more work in-house in some cases, but has reduced the amount of four-color work.
"Because of all the cost restraints in healthcare with managed care and all of that, we are having to watch our budget really close," Penkala adds.
St. Helena Hospital toyed with the possibility of giving its nurses a computer at their stations to print all the forms they needed, reveals Penkala. But it was found to be more cost effective to keep the in-plant, since the nurses get paid more than the in-plant employees, and it would take up too much of their time.
Penkala also sees more of the paper forms becoming electronic forms. Already the autopsy forms have gone this route, she says.
Mergers, such as the one Taylor experienced at Methodist Healthcare, affect the amount of work for healthcare in-plants. For Taylor, this occurred three years ago when Methodist purchased Lebonheur Children's Medical Center. With this merger, the in-plant saw its color work increase, and eventually the shop had to expand.
Taylor recently got approval to combine the two shops he runs into one main print shop. He plans to move into his new location in three or four months. Methodist currently has a five-year projected plan for the shop, which includes $5 million worth of new equipment.
In July of 1997 Beck also experienced a merger. That was when Geisinger Health System merged with Hershey Medical Center, to form Penn State Geisinger Health System. Beck became the adopted manager of a small reprographics center in Hershey, Pa., which he now visits two days a week. Penn State Geisinger serves 80 to 90 clinic sites throughout central Pennsylvania.
Along with growth, mergers bring the increased pressure of giving timely service to even more customers. This has been the biggest challenge that mergers have brought to Harter, who has seen the number of regional centers (clinics) under Marshfield's umbrella grow rapidly.
"Some of the communities in northern Wisconsin are fairly small communities that desired to work with us," Harter says. "I guess the term we could use is partners. They just have to practice medicine and the system will take care of the rest."
For Penkala, a merger occurred just a few months ago when St. Helena bought First Hospital, a small psychiatric hospital now known as California Specialty Hospital. She notes that this merger has added some more work for the in-plant but has not increased staffing. The in-plant also serves some clinics owned by the hospital, providing printing but not mailing services.
by CHRIS BAUER
