An Investigation of Business Process Management on the Application of RFID on the Case of Medical Blood Pack Handling

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) provides an opportunity to explore a new approach with regards to information management and demonstrates an evolved business paradigm shift with regards to the Logistics Flows within Supply Chain Management of Blood Pack Handling (BPH). BPH is a mission-critical activity within the medical community and life sciences industry, Applications of RFID should not only be considered as a matter of ICT but more importantly as an evolution of Business Process Management (BPM) to increase the effectiveness of healthcare tasks. Hence, this research aims at exploring the best practice of using RFID as a utility to improve the BPH performance. To achieve this goal, we conducted a survey on RFID and Business Process and Performance Management as it pertains to BPH. Additionally we have looked at the implication of RFID in comparison with conventional Bar Code technology which is currently utilized in BPH. The outcome of this research is the strength of RFID over previous techniques in use and the CSF's that are required for effective RFID application. The case study was conducted through field observation and expert interviews. We have provided an operating model incorporating RFID for evaluation as an improved process by which to manage BPH. Accordingly, we propose the recommendation for blood pack data format to be included on the RFID Tag and provide a recommendation for the layout of RFID readers and the information system infrastructure as a whole. As a consequence, this paper presents an evaluation on quantitative as well as qualitative KPIs with respect to RFID application to ensure that the best practices of BPH can be delivered via BPM. The result shows that the application of RFID in BPH leads to an improvement of the quality and effectiveness of BPH.