Today we had a little bit of a later wake up time and around 9:00 we headed to medochemie. Yesterdays lab got us all thinking about the medical production in Cyprus so i was excited to visit an actual company rather than a student lab. During our Medochemie meeting we were able to learn about their quality checks and the different department in their company to ensure efficient and viable production.
The medial facilities in cyprus greatly differ form those in America. In America the medial industry rides on monetary compensation and its commonly seen that the “ends justify the means”. From everything we have heard at metochemie they are extremely detailed when it comes to procedure and are constantly updating based on even a single cases that may end badly. One major example of this is the implementation of their main GMP they first introduced in 1962 directly after the Thalidomide tragedy. It details rules concerning quality, personal training, hygiene, equipment calibration, and documentation for each stage of the process.
The healthcare supply chain is an extensive network of systems, components, and processes that collectively work to ensure medicines and other healthcare supplies are manufactured, distributed, and provided to patients.The business side of this meeting gave insight to how they deal with global distributors and third parties such as insurance. It is interesting to see the effect on the supply chain of this industry in medical aspects.
We were walked though their business planning and budget planning stages that directly correlate to the tactical sale and their operational stages. The times lines from material required through stages of detailed scheduling to actual order leasing takes months at each step which was really interesting to hear about. So in events such as covid if one aspect is slowed down it affects the global supply chain by upwards of a few years. Every stage needs to be operating in cooperation and planning stages need to be as detailed as possible to allow customers to receive products at the appropriate time.
After lunch at the marina we had a meeting with the Columbia ship management company. I was able to take a tour of the premises and visit the multifunction room and performance + optimization control room. These were very interesting to see and again was able to see direct impact on global supply chains. If they are unable to manage a small fleet and then another one gets backed up it sets delays for months. The timelines required in these industries leads to passionate workers being the ones behind the companies which makes them run smoothly. When we were in the main control room we learned how the emerge y team assemblies to handle any situation. We learned how they are required to be on the clock 24/7 and report to the emergency room at any time. This industry plays a major part in the global supply chains so it is very interesting to see that because of their vital role they require employees to be on call at all times.
