Healthcare is arguably the most important industry in the world, but managing healthcare is an incredibly challenging and complex undertaking. You have to combine expertise from multiple disciplines in order to overcome ever-evolving systems that try to wrangle a vast quantity of files of patient data and insurance documents, disparate office equipment and imaging equipment, various software solutions, and more. 

The brutally honest bottom line is that no single person can handle everything necessary to run a healthcare facility. It’s too much, and that is why everyone needs expert help available on demand. You need an IT department that can handle computers, accountants for the money and taxes, and while you’re looking into ways to incorporate expertise at every turn, you need printing experts to make sure you aren’t wasting resources on inadequate printing systems, inefficient systems, or careless printing habits. Printing might seem like a small problem, but printing issues add up faster than you might expect, affecting your bottom line. That’s where Managed Print Services can help.

Diagnosing the Problem 

Do you even know how much you spend on ink and paper for printing? What about maintenance costs for your hardware? Have you tracked upgrade costs? There’s a good chance you can find those numbers if you dig a bit, but the problem runs deeper.

Here’s a tough one to calculate. Do you know how much labor cost is wasted in printer downtime or inefficiency?

If you can provide hard numerical answers to all of those questions, you already have an idea of the value of Managed Print Services. If just one of those costs is still a question mark for you, it’s time to explore what Managed Print Services can do and see just how much opportunity exists to save money and make your healthcare facility run better.

What Is Managed Print? 

Managed Print Services (MPS) is a common solution for businesses in all industries. In a nutshell, it’s a method of outsourcing the management or administration of your in-house printing and imaging fleet, from copiers to scanners to fax machines. It is not completely outsourcing your printing jobs. You will still have printing equipment on the premises for your staff to use, but you won’t have to worry so much about taking care of it or if you are spending too much to use your devices.

The point of MPS is that it provides consistent oversight and access to printing while making the logistics of printing more efficient and cost-effective. Your printing can become a reliable part of your healthcare system, and Managed Print Services can alleviate a lot of problems that you might not have fully realized are present.

How Managed Print Will Alleviate Headaches for Healthcare Providers  

You are a healthcare provider, not a tech expert. That’s true for pretty much everyone in the industry, and it creates the same problems for everyone. You are required to know more than is reasonable about the technology you use in order to make good decisions regarding that tech. There’s an easier way. Involve a technology expert in the process. By outsourcing the management of your tech to an expert, you gain tons of advantages. The sheer scope of problems solved by Managed Print Services can transform any healthcare facility—from hospitals to pharmacies and even insurance offices. Here are some of the most significant ways MPS removes headaches.

Diminishing Downtime 

MPS will regularly provide recommendations for upgrading your equipment while providing maintenance on your existing devices as part of your contract. You don’t even have to keep track of printer ink. By applying professional maintenance services to your practice’s printing systems, you remove menial downtime that regularly plagues healthcare facilities. Downtime from paper or ink shortages disappears. Equipment malfunctions, slow printers, and outdated systems are all removed from the equation.

With these problems solved, healthcare providers are free to do their real jobs focusing on patient care instead of fighting with printers and related technology.

Reducing Contact  

If the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that we need to be generally better about reducing contact in places with a high risk of contagion. Direct care facilities will likely improve their long-term approaches to minimizing contact as a result of the pandemic.

All of that considered, employing Managed Print Services reduces the total points of contact in your facility. The primary way this is done is by consolidating vendors. You don’t need separate contracts for each piece of equipment, ink or toner purchases, or other consumables. Your MPS provider handles all of that so that you can reduce the number of contacts down to one. It’s a better way to prevent the spread of disease, and it’s something we all take more seriously than we used to.

Better Security 

Properly securing private patient data is a huge consideration for healthcare facilities. For starters, it’s the right thing to do. No one should have their privacy compromised because they chose you as a provider. Data security is also integral to HIPAA and other regulations. You can’t have insecure printers that put patient information at risk.

Your Managed Print Services provider will take responsibility for printer security to ensure that you are compliant, and if something still happens to the data, they assume liability on your behalf. It’s a wonderful buffer against honest mistakes that may have disastrous consequences.

Reducing Costs 

Reducing costs is essential in every industry, but it feels doubly important in healthcare. Considering that, it is shocking how much money you can waste on inefficient printing administration and practices. Bad maintenance schedules, poor upgrades, and general inefficiencies in the system rack up expenses quickly. Your Managed Print Services provider thrives on being able to optimize that efficiency for you, ultimately lowering printing costs and your total overhead.

The healthcare industry stands to benefit massively from embracing the power of Managed Print Services. If your Ohio practice would like to explore the idea in more detail, contact Modern Office Methods today. We’ll review your current print environment, discuss your options, and answer your questions so that you can have a clear picture of what you stand to gain.