By Dr Preetam Basu, Kent Business School
Diagnostic laboratories underpin modern healthcare, yet their inventory practices have traditionally been optimised for availability and cost rather than sustainability. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed how fragile inventory systems, over-reliant on just-in-time deliveries, global suppliers, and single-use consumables, can rapidly become sources of waste, inefficiency, and risk. Expired reagents, emergency orders, and disrupted cold chains not only increased costs but also generated avoidable carbon emissions and clinical delays. Sustainable inventory management is therefore no longer a “nice to have”; it is a core capability for resilient, high-quality diagnostics within the NHS.
Why Inventory Matters in Diagnostics
Diagnostic inventories are uniquely challenging. Reagents and controls are often temperature-sensitive, expiry-limited, and regulated, while test demand can fluctuate sharply with seasonal illness, outbreaks, or service reconfiguration. Poor forecasting, limited visibility of stock across sites, and conservative safety buffers lead directly to wastage and unnecessary repeat procurement. In the UK context, where the NHS has committed to net zero and value-based healthcare, reducing inventory-related waste aligns environmental responsibility with patient safety and financial stewardship. Sustainable inventory management reframes stock as a strategic asset rather than a consumable overhead.
Key Practices for Sustainable Diagnostic Inventory
Sustainable inventory management begins with standardisation and rationalisation. Reducing unnecessary variation in assays, platforms, and consumables across a trust, or across pathology networks, lowers the number of stock-keeping units (SKUs) that must be managed. This simplification improves demand forecasting, enables more effective bulk purchasing, and reduces the risk that low-use or niche items expire unused on laboratory shelves. Closely linked to this is expiry-driven stock rotation and demand-led replenishment. Setting reorder levels based on real test activity helps laboratories balance availability with waste reduction. Within the UK, networked pathology services and shared service models also create opportunities to redistribute near-expiry stock between sites, preventing unnecessary disposal while maintaining continuity of testing. These practices are enabled by digital visibility and robust governance. Electronic inventory systems, particularly when linked to analyser utilisation data, allow laboratories to track lot numbers, expiry dates, and consumption trends in near real time. This supports proactive decision-making, reduces reliance on carbon-intensive emergency courier deliveries, and strengthens compliance with quality and regulatory requirements. Finally, sustainable inventory management must be embedded within green procurement and waste-reduction strategies. The NHS England Design for Life roadmap encourages suppliers to reduce packaging, improve shelf life where feasible, and support take-back or recycling schemes. Inventory teams play a critical role by translating these ambitions into practice, specifying sustainability criteria at the point of purchase and monitoring how stock choices influence downstream waste and emissions.
Towards Smarter, More Resilient Diagnostic Inventory
Sustainable inventory management in diagnostics is not about holding less stock, but about holding the right stock—standardised, visible, and aligned with real patterns of clinical demand. Moving away from precautionary overstocking towards data-driven decision-making reduces expiry-related waste, avoids carbon-intensive emergency procurement, and safeguards continuity of testing. The way forward lies in embedding these principles consistently across pathology networks and Integrated Care Systems (ICS). This requires digital inventory systems, defined governance arrangements at pathology network or ICS level to oversee stockholding, redistribution, and accountability, and procurement frameworks that reward waste prevention and resilience, not just unit cost. By treating inventory as a strategic asset rather than an operational afterthought, NHS diagnostic services can strengthen resilience, protect quality, and deliver lasting value for patients while supporting national net-zero ambitions.
To explore opportunities for partnership, please contact p.basu@kent.ac.uk