Relocating Imaging Equipment? 3 Tips to Save Time, Money, Stress

When your hospital decides it's time to upgrade that 64-slice CT to the latest and greatest 256-slice CT, before you trade in, take a minute to think about all the ways the 64-slice could be utilized within your healthcare system. More and more healthcare systems are discovering opportunities to keep systems they may have previously traded in and deploy them in outpatient or rural hospital settings.  

If you represent a hospital ready to relocate a piece of imaging equipment, here are some tips that will save you time, money, and stress:

Consider a Third Party

The OEM might not be excited to help you. Moving used equipment is not what OEM field service teams are staffed to do, and those hefty hourly rates add up fast! A third-party service organization like Block Imaging can often do the job for a fraction of the price. But you might be thinking, "What about the risk?"

Determine Who Holds the Risk

Some hospitals assume that the OEM service contract will carry over without interruption if they pay the manufacturer for the relocation. Often, that's not the case. Independent service companies (Block Imaging included) can usually walk a hospital through the best approach for who holds which portion of the risk in a system relocation. Now you might be thinking "Will the OEM still service my system after someone else relocates it?"

Make a New Service Strategy

Removing a system from service at location A and re-deploying it at location B is a great way to end a service contract that no longer makes sense for your hospital. The new home for your MRI in an outpatient clinic or rural hospital might lead you to consider a third-party service contract or even time and materials or preventative maintenance-only agreements. If not, you can always have the OEM come in to evaluate and  approve the equipment for service again in the new location. 

Find out more about your service options here

For Example

Here is an example of how one healthcare system could leverage all three tips to maximize their savings:

Your main campus MRI is five years old and you want to upgrade to the latest model. It's also currently under an OEM "platinum level" service contract for about $130k per year. Meanwhile, your outpatient clinic, two states over, is scanning with an 18 year-old system. After reading this blog, you consider relocating the five year-old MRI to the outpatient clinic. "Good idea!" your OEM rep says, and even offers to take the 18 year-old MRI as a trade-in. However, when you see the relocation quote for $80k and think about staying in a $130k per year service contract, the trade-in value pales in comparison and you say "thanks but no thanks". Instead you have an independent team handle the relocation for $50k and take over service coverage for $85k per year. You saved big money with a system you already owned, then saved big money on the relocation, and you're now saving big money each year on service (not to mention your outpatient center jumps forward a generation or two in MRI technology).

The Takeaway

While the example above focused on an MRI project, the math behind these tips works for other modalities too- like CT, cath labs, digital mammography, and much more. If your organization operates multiple facilities, exploring imaging system relocation between them can be a powerful way to save thousands while improving the equipment stable across your network. If you're considering relocation, we'd love to help. Use the button below to contact our team for a project consultation.