Equipment Procurement & Services

The rapid advancement in the technology of Medical Equipments, increasing complexity of the equipment, the manufacturers moving towards closed type of equipments, and to provide importance to after sales services of the equipments procured, the Equipment section was started in KMSCL from the year 2010.

The primarily objective of the equipment section is to procure equipments for the institutions under Directorate of Health Services and Directorate of Medical Education through various funds. The total life cycle cost of the equipment is considered for the evaluation of the lowest bidders. The division procures small equipment like weighing machine to high end equipments like MRI Scanners, Linear Accelerators, etc through transparent tender process. All tenders invited are e- tenders in the portal of Govt. of Kerala. All major equipments procured will have 3 to 5 years comprehensive warranty period and the rate for Comprehensive Annual Maintenance Contract is fixed for a further period of 5 to 7 years. The minor equipments will have a warranty period of 1 to 2 years depending upon the cost of the equipment. The rate of proprietary consumables / reagents required for the functioning of the equipment is fixed during the tender process. The equipments which requires specialized infrastructure for the installation are done through the suppliers of the equipments by including as 'turnkey' in the tender process itself.

The Corporation being the Central procurement agency for the department of Health and family Welfare, all the tenders invited are fixed as 'Running Contract' for a period for two years. The Running Contract details are published in the website of KMSCL and the User Institutions are provided with an option to procure the equipments directly from the supplier at the running contract rate. The corporation also publishes the available list of equipments in the running contract of KMSCL every month, enabling the user institutions to procure equipments which are not in the running contract of KMSCL.

The Corporation gives paramount importance for the upkeep of the equipment in the user institutions. A toll free number 1800 425 0004 was provided to the user institutions for registering the complaints of the equipments during the warranty period. All the complaints received were logged and appropriate actions taken through the respective suppliers. The preventive maintenance done by the firms for each equipment monitored and the performance security was discharged after the warranty obligations are fulfilled.

One of the major challenges faced by the Health Services departments is the execution of minor clinical projects like setting up of dialysis centers, Assisted Reproductive Technology centres. etc which requires minor specialized infrastructure works including supply  and installation of various equipments. KMSCL has taken up this task and executes clinical projects like setting up of Cath Lab and Cardiac Care Units, Dialysis Centres, Medical Gas Pipeline Systems, Central Sterile Services Department (CSSD), Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) centres, etc. The Corporation also provide technical consultancy services for various clinical projects to the agencies like PWD, LSGD etc.

The maintenance of the equipments under the Directorate of Health Services which are out of warranty period is done by KMSCL through a project named ' Biomedical Equipment Maintenance Management Programme '  (BEMP). Under this programme the maintenance of the equipments are done through a third party maintenance provider. All the equipments in the hospital from the level of PHC are covered under the project. The equipment in the facilities are bar-coded and a 24x7 IVRS based call centre is established with toll free 1800 2700 690 to register the complaints of the equipments.