Supply Chain Collaboration
FormLabs Partnership
We are proud to announce our innovative partnership with FormLabs Ohio to create nasal swabs in the fight to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
News Articles/Videos About Partnership
Local business making swabs for COVID-19 testing
Concordance partners with NW Ohio company to provide testing swabs
As pressure grows to reopen economy, a scramble to make nasal swabs for coronavirus testing leads to 3D printers
Continuity of Supply
Concordance is making every effort to ensure the continuity of supply. We have implemented daily huddles for all our management and leadership teams to quickly assess the ever-evolving state of the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on our daily updates, Concordance will adapt our operations in order to proactively support our customer’s changing needs.
Working with our supplier partners to understand and manage the pandemic’s impact on product supply, Concordance also collaborates with trade groups, including the Health Industry Distributors Association (HIDA) to respond to industry wide challenges. Following the current guidelines set forth by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), Concordance continues to engage with customers, industry experts and government officials to assist customers in urgent need of medical supplies.
Concordance has been intimately involved in a Private Sector COVID-19 Supply Chain Coalition since mid-March which consists of key distributors and numerous federal agencies including Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and finally the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT). This COVID-19 Supply Chain Coalition was created to form a direct line of communication between the Healthcare Distribution community and the Federal government in order to ensure proper allocation of product within the healthcare supply chain.
As the COVID-19 pandemic changes daily, we will continue to closely monitor developments across the country and modify our operations accordingly.
Customer Communications
July 10, 2020
Dear Customers,
Your continued dedication to positively impacting the lives of your patients and the health of our communities is mirrored by our unwavering commitment to supporting your cause. As we move through the summer months of extended regulations and product shortages due to the pandemic, we wanted to update you on a few items of impact and help you plan accordingly.
We are beginning to see a shortage of gloves throughout the supply chain and want to ensure that our customers are adequately prepared for any potential surge capacity that may occur in the coming months. According to the CDC, surge capacity refers to the ability to manage a sudden, unexpected increase in patient volume that would otherwise severely challenge or exceed the present capacity of a facility. While there are no widely accepted measurements or triggers to distinguish this from daily patient care volume, surge capacity is a useful framework from which to approach a decreased supply of gloves during the COVID-19 response.
Three general strata have been used to describe surge capacity, which can be used to prioritize measures in conserving glove supplies along the continuum of care. Below are the FDA and CDC suggested strategies for each strata:
Conventional Capacity:
- Continue providing patient care without any change in daily contemporary practices.
Contingency Capacity:
- Use of gloves past their manufacturer-designated shelf life for training activities.
- Use of gloves conforming to other U.S. and international standards.
Crisis Capacity:
- Use of gloves past their manufacturer-designated shelf life for healthcare delivery.
- Prioritize the use of non-sterile disposable gloves.
- Consider non-healthcare glove alternatives.
- Extended use of disposable medical gloves.
We are here to help you manage your current glove inventory and supply chain, understand your glove utilization rates and prepare your storerooms and ordering processes to help ensure adequate glove supply during the coming months. Please reach out directly to your Account Manager and Customer Support team for collaboration opportunities concerning your glove supply.
We are also working to enhance our StrategicStorage™ program to offer the most efficient, effective and timely pandemic supply solution to our customers. We will share information on this program, along with other industry, governmental and internal updates on our COVID-19 Resource page.
If you have any concerns, needs or collaboration opportunities that can be addressed by our team to support your facility during this time, please feel free to reach out at anytime.
Stay Safe | Stay Healthy | Stay Awesome
Gina Marchese
Executive Vice President
Past Communications
April 9, 2020: Letter from the CEO
April 23, 2020: Letter from Gina Marchese, EVP
May 8, 2020: Letter from Gina Marchese, EVP
May 22, 2020: Letter from Gina Marchese, EVP
June 12, 2020: Letter from Gina Marchese, EVP