Service Magazine Fall 2017

20 | @Service Magazine Summer 2017 Program enhancements help field team members deliver the highest quality service In the simplest sense, world-class quality service means keeping customers’ devices in top condition and available for safe and effective patient care. On a deeper level it means having trained field engineers and biomedical engineering technicians with the latest service documentation. Making repairs using the appropriate tools and technology. Using original equipment and validated parts. Completing testing data sheets documenting that the equipment is safe to use. And giving customers an accurate and complete report on the service performed. No shortcuts. No workarounds. Just diligent service, all the time. It’s all spelled out in the GE Quality Management System (QMS). “It’s up to field teams to remain rigorous in delivering service with high integrity,” says Chad Vande Hei , Quality Director. That means: • Stopping work if the right tool or part is not available for a repair; escalating or transferring repair activities you are not able to address. • Informing managers about service issues so they can work to resolve them and improve underlying processes. • Watching for opportunities to make service delivery even better, and suggesting them to leadership. Meanwhile, dedicated teams are taking steps to simplify service and enhance quality. For example, a team led by Tom Schiller , Global Service Parts Quality Improvement Manager, is directing an initiative to improve parts packaging to reduce the number of parts that fail on arrival or soon after being installed. All inbound and outbound FE Reseals to the Carol Streamwarehouse are being visually screened and repacked, if necessary. These efforts will help improve customer and FE satisfaction, maximize uptime for customers, and reduce costs for GE Healthcare. Another initiative, QMS Refresh, is simplifying quality assurance training for service. The training has been fine-tuned so that all material included is directly relevant to service issues; the volume of material has been reduced by half. In August, a new Service Information Management System (SIMS) was deployed, making it easier to get service manuals and forms. The system automatically updates manuals to the latest version, eliminating the need to check for revisions before service events. It’s all designed to help customers deliver the highest quality care and separate GE Healthcare Service from our competition. Quality verified Everyone in the USCAN Service business can take pride in the recent annual audit for certification under the ISO 13485:2016 international Quality Management System for medical devices. “Our teams performed well, and the auditors found no major problems,” says Chad Vande Hei, Quality Director. That bodes well for certification by the ISO board in September. The audit was designed to verify that our equipment fulfills customer needs and is safe and effective, and that service people are properly trained and equipped, and follow proper procedures. Field teammembers demonstrated those attributes during the audit, conducted in the Northeast and Southeast zones. “The auditors made many visits to customer sites to see how our people completed their tasks,” says Chad. “They spent a week each in the Northeast and Southeast Zones and a week at Research Park in Milwaukee covering the call center, multi-vendor and remote service, technical training, and more. The quality organization is grateful to the teams that took part in the audit.” Keeping it World-Class