Why 73% of Clinic Stock-Outs Are Completely Preventable

Most clinics don't have a supply problem — they have a visibility problem.

I've spent years working in healthcare supply chain and the pattern is always the same: a clinic runs out of something critical, panic-orders at premium prices, then goes back to the same broken system that caused the stock-out in the first place.

Here's what actually causes most stock-outs:

1. No par levels set. If you don't know your minimum threshold for each item, you're guessing. And guessing fails on the exact day you can't afford it to.

2. Ordering based on "feel." "We seem low on gloves" is not inventory management. You need consumption data — even rough estimates beat intuition.

3. No safety stock for high-variability items. Some supplies have steady demand. Others spike unpredictably (think flu season, procedure surges). If you treat them the same, you'll get burned.

The fix isn't complicated. It's a system: track what you use, set reorder points, and build a small buffer for the items that matter most.

I built the Stock-Out Prevention Toolkit to give clinic managers exactly this — ready-to-use templates, reorder calculators, and a community of people solving the same problems.

If you're running a clinic and tired of the stock-out cycle, check it out.