This document provides an overview of the Supply Chain and Health domain overlap. This was discussed on the 18 May 2018 Supply Chain Call. Both the Health and Supply Chain domains define metadata for locations, health workers and terminologies. At the high level, there appears to be great overlap, but when we get down to the details, the field level detail is different. This document focuses on identifying these differences to drive the discussion moving forward.

Definitions

Commodity - A commodity is a good that can be consumed.

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Supply Chain Domain - The Supply Chain domain focuses on delivering a particular commodity to the point of service with the focus on ensuring that the commodity is available to be dispensed when the health worker needs it. As soon as the commodity is opened to be dispensed, the supply chain considers the commodity completely used for it's intended purpose. Any wastage that takes place up to that point is considered "Wastage" by the supply chain. This is also referred to as "Closed Vial Wastage" in immunisation programmes. An example of closed vial wastage would be if a vial of BCG fell and broke before it was opened. Another example would be when the vaccine expiresvaccines become ineffective due to expiry dates or broken cold chains.

Health Domain - The health domain considers wastage at a level lower than the supply chain because they are primarily focused on ensuring the commodity is appropriately dispensed to the patient. The health domain tracks wastage if there are doses available that have not been dispensed to a patient. In the immunisation programme, this is commonly referred to as "Open Vial Wastage", which is an available dose of an immunisation that wasn't injected into a patient's arm. An example of open vial wastage is if a 20 dose vial of BCG is opened, but only 5 children showed up on a particular day. In this case, 15 doses of BCG would be wasted because they were available, but were not properly dispensed to a patient.