0:00 / 0:00
Success Story
CHEC achieves real-time stock visibility, giving hundreds of clinical hours back to patient care
CHEC was previously managing stock through manual counts recorded in spreadsheets. Clinical teams were spending more than 290 hours a month counting stock, time that would otherwise have been spent on patient care.
Zebra Success Story: CHEC
Overview: Healthcare Challenge
CHEC wanted to enable accurate, real-time tracking of medical consumables and assets across 35+ hospital sites—while reducing manual stock counts, preventing patient delays, and freeing clinical staff to focus on care.
Benefits / Outcomes
- ~50% reduction in overall stock holding
- 290+ clinical hours per month returned to patient care
- Faster, more reliable access to time-sensitive care
- Reduced waste through precise, data-driven ordering
About CHEC
In healthcare, stock availability can be the difference between treatment delivered or care delayed. Every appointment depends on having the right consumables, medications, and equipment in place at the right time and in the right location. For frontline teams, managing stock can become a constant background pressure, one that directly shapes the patient experience.
For large healthcare providers like CHEC, that challenge quickly becomes more complex. Founded in 2012, CHEC is one of the UK’s leading National Health Service (NHS) partners for community-based specialist medical services. Today, the organisation operates more than 35 hospitals nationwide, works with around 2,500 optometrist practices, and supports over 570,000 patient appointments each year.
The Challenge
Across its 35 sites, CHEC was previously managing stock through manual counts recorded in spreadsheets. “To work out what stock we needed to purchase for each site, we had to understand what they already had—and the only way to do that was manual counting,” explains Vicky Moore, Head of Procurement at CHEC. “If we don't have the stock, we can't see a patient, or we can’t operate. So, it would lead to cancellations and very unhappy patients.” Clinical teams were spending more than 290 hours a month counting stock, time that would otherwise have been spent on patient care.
Errors were inevitable, and the impact was felt quickly. Monthly stock counts produced significant variances at month end, making it difficult to plan accurately or maintain consistent stock levels. “One wrong formula and the entire sheet is wrong,” says Benjamin Rumford, Stock Coordinator at CHEC.
As the organisation continued to grow, these manual, time-consuming processes became unsustainable. “CHEC has been on a rapid growth journey over the last five years,” Moore notes. “We met with Zebra Technologies and saw the solution in action, and it was clear that RFID was the right way forward for us.”
CHEC’s priority was to improve efficiency and accuracy. “The more accurate we are, the tighter we can run stock—moving closer to just-in-time deliveries, reducing waste and cost, and lowering the risk of patient cancellations,” Moore explains. The organisation needed a single platform capable of tracking medical consumables and high-value assets, integrating with existing systems, and delivering consistent results at scale, with a minimum target of 95% stock accuracy. After evaluating the options, Zebra Technologies hardware paired with TagworX software emerged as the best fit.
With RFID technology, we can do monthly stock counts in five hours instead of more than 290, and with far greater accuracy. Counting our distribution hub would previously have taken six to seven hours. Now, it’s a five-minute scan.
The Solution
With operations spanning 35 hospital sites, scalability was a central consideration for CHEC. The RFID system needed to support hundreds of readers concurrently, integrate with existing procurement and inventory systems, and maintain consistent stock rules at each site.
To automate asset tracking across its estate, CHEC introduced TagworX alongside a range of RFID-enabled hardware from Zebra Technologies. Clinical and operations teams use Zebra HC2X/HC5X Series mobile computers paired with Zebra RFD40 RFID sleds to read consumables and assets on demand. Zebra FX9600 fixed readers and Zebra AN5X-7X Series antennas provide continuous visibility in key storage and movement areas. Items are labelled using Zebra ZD600 Series desktop printers, along with Zebra RFID labels and ribbons, ensuring every item can be tracked throughout its lifecycle.
The rollout was led by Tec-RFID, with regular check-ins to keep teams aligned and the project moving forward. Alongside deploying the hardware, Tec-RFID configured TagworX to reflect how CHEC operates in practice and carried out extensive accuracy testing, looking at tags, antennas, reader placement, and power settings. "We needed to make sure everything was working as it should,” says Moore. “We also reviewed how stock moves around the hospital, so when items move from one room to another we can count them as consumed. That gives us clear visibility into actual usage.” Each item was given a unique digital identity, stock rules were set at the site level so hospitals could manage inventory independently, and the system was tailored to follow CHEC’s real clinical workflows.
The new setup starts in procurement. Using real-time inventory data, the system calculates how much stock is needed and generates purchase orders. “Previously, we were raising hundreds of purchase orders,” says Rumford. “Now, stock is centralised at the hub, and we raise just one purchase order per supplier.”
Items are delivered to CHEC’s central distribution hub, where each product is labelled with an RFID tag and logged into TagworX, creating a unique digital record for every item. As stock is dispatched to clinics, teams read it on arrival to update its location in the system. “We can see the full history—every location an item has been in,” Rumford adds.
The Zebra Difference: Outcome and Benefits
As a result, CHEC now has live visibility into stock levels at any point in time—what each clinic has on hand, what it needs, and what is already on the way. That transparency also allows teams to compare stock levels against actual clinic activity and quickly spot changes in demand. “We can make sure our medical teams have what they need before they even realise they need it,” explains Moore.
Live, accurate data helps reduce waste by enabling precise ordering decisions. “With better visibility of batch numbers and expiry dates, we can clearly understand our own usage,” Moore adds. “As a result, we’ve cut the amount of stock we’re holding by around 50%”. In turn, clinics can repurpose storage space for activities such as diagnostics—helping reduce waiting times and deliver urgent care sooner.
This level of traceability is especially critical for high-value medical assets. If a piece of equipment fails at one clinic, teams can quickly identify a spare elsewhere and redeploy it without disrupting services. In the event of a product recall, CHEC can immediately see which clinics received the affected batch. “That speed could prevent harm,” notes Rumford.
The biggest benefit is the amount of time saved. “With RFID technology, we can do monthly stock counts in five hours instead of more than 290, and with far greater accuracy,” Rumford says. This translates into time savings equivalent to nearly 1,200 cataract surgeries. “Counting our distribution hub would previously have taken six to seven hours. Now, it’s a five-minute scan.”
This has completely transformed how CHEC clinical staff delegate their time. “The idea is that clinical staff will spend less time thinking about stock,” explains Antonia Fox, Hospital Manager at CHEC. “Stock management is automated—everything arrives just in time for when we need it. That frees up clinical staff to focus on patient care, and in the long term, it leads to a better patient experience overall.”
With more time redirected toward patient care, CHEC has also been able to expand its services. “We’re moving into areas like dermatology and otolaryngology, which means additional clinics and more patients being seen,” says Rumford. That efficiency also translates into faster access to care. “I’ve spoken to patients who were facing six-month waiting lists at hospitals. When they come to CHEC, it’s often a week.”
CHEC clinicians have quickly embraced the new setup. “When we first told staff, ‘You’ll just stand in the room and read the tags,’ nobody believed us,” shares Fox. “Once staff see the software, it clicks. It’s one button. If you’ve got 100 items, the handheld reader picks them up in a few seconds,” adds Rumford.
That ease of use has been critical to adoption. “Because the system is intuitive, it’s easy for hospital managers and frontline teams to get up and running,” explains Rumford. Just as important is the confidence it creates. “Staff no longer worry about whether they’ll run out of supplies. That peace of mind is invaluable,” Rumford adds.
CHEC now plans to roll RFID out across its remaining sites. From there, the focus will shift beyond consumables, with greater emphasis on tracking and managing fixed assets. “Our RFID journey has given us real confidence that investing in technology is the right path forward,” says Moore. “It supports continuous improvement, drives efficiency, and helps us work smarter, not harder. Our aim is to be trailblazers in introducing new technology into healthcare, while always putting patients at the centre of everything we do.”
Featured Products and Solutions
