![]() Relying on vendors and attending industry engagements keeps the engineers up-to-date with the latest trends, and allows them to develop important relationships. “I knew that there was wiggle room, so I told the customer we’d make it part of the specifications and identified that requirement in the beginning, so vendors knew exactly what type of equipment the customer wanted in the first place.” Keeping up with the Industry “By saying you just wanted a full body scan, a vendor can say, ‘Okay, well, we can offer a full body scan, but you just have to move the patient,’” Scobee said. Scobee translated it for the contract solicitation so there was no confusion between the vendor, contracting officer or customer. “I knew this and I talked with the customer and found they wanted the full body scan without having to move the patient, but they weren’t saying that when they were looking to buy a scanner.” The scanner can come either with a standard table that scans most of a body where the patient may need to be rotated, or with a longer table that scans without a rotation,” Scobee said. “I had a customer who wanted to buy a full body scanner, but they didn’t know how to word the requirement in order to get that across. The engineers also identify where the customer isn’t translating their needs appropriately. Understanding what the customer wants and directing the customer to the right vendor is the key to a successful transaction. We have those connections with the vendors and we know the options or packages that the customer may want, or we may see something that doesn’t seem right.” “They may buy one every six years, where we’re buying them every day. “A lot of the military treatment facilities, they don’t have the expertise on the equipment and they’re not buying CT scanners every year to get good pricing,” Scobee said. ![]() The engineers are also familiar with Medical’s purchasing power, or their ability to leverage better pricing based on quantity and frequency of purchases, and they can discuss specifics with contracting officers and vendors on behalf of the customer. In addition to the contracting officer, Scobee says the engineers also need to translate requests into languages for the technical panels that come up with equipment standardization, physicists, facilities personnel and clinicians because they all have a role in acquiring the new equipment. ![]() “We’re not doing engineering designing or anything like that, but we’re doing a lot of translating for the contracting officer,” Denise Scobee, a Medical biomedical engineer, said. Starting from the moment a customer reaches out for help to equipment installation, the engineers engage with many different specialties and communicate needs that the customer often doesn’t know how to translate. Medical’s team doesn’t conduct typical hands-on engineer work. ![]() With their expertise and Troop Support Medical’s purchasing power, they help customers, at a moment’s notice, maintain military treatment facilities’ readiness. They bring a wealth of knowledge about the capital equipment, and continuously engage with industry to learn about trends, the options and functions of capital equipment, and which equipment best meets customers’ needs. The engineers understand the technical, clinical and contracting language, so they serve as the translators between the customer, vendor and contracting officer. It would be understandable if a customer didn’t have much confidence before making a purchase of this magnitude.įortunately, for those looking to purchase capital equipment such as X-ray machines, MRI equipment or CT scan machines, a team of Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support biomedical engineers is ready to help.Īs part of the DLA Troop Support Medical supply chain’s Capital Equipment Division, the engineers make sure customers purchase the right equipment, for the right reason, at the right price. Add on the fact that that lives depend on their ability to order the right equipment and have it installed quickly. They only know what they need, and have to place the order, with those fine details, in a language that the vendor and contractor making the acquisition can understand. To do so, they have to use their limited knowledge about the equipment’s full capabilities and specifications. ![]() Imagine a customer needs to purchase a multi-million dollar piece of equipment. ![]()
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