Buying Processes within Hospitals in Sweden - A case study on procurement of technically complex products

Abstract: When public organizations in Sweden conduct purchasing, they are obliged by regulations to conduct public procurement, why the regulations have a clear effect on their buying behavior. For hospitals, that all are subject to these laws, purchasing the right product is further of utmost importance due to the clear impact it has on patient safety, which must be guaranteed. Today there is no extensive mapping of the purchase behavior at hospitals, especially regarding technically complex products. This thesis aims to obtain an understanding of buying behavior for technically complex products at hospitals in Sweden, and provide managerial implications, through studying the purchase process, the people involved and the purchase criteria they use. The research is conducted through a case study of three Swedish hospitals, together with theory and literature studies. We develop a general buying model for the studied cases and conclude that the purchase process for hospitals is extensive, includes many people and professions, and that the criteria used by each profession to evaluate offers have a clear link to the factors their individual performance in turn is evaluated on. We further find that purchasers mainly focus on administrative aspects and clinicians on user aspects, while technicians function as a linking interface between those two professions. Moreover, clinicians are found to be crucial to the process due to their role as final users of the products.