Quality control checks are a routine part of our process that, as a well-rounded and trusted supplier, we often take for granted.
It’s only when we hear from customers that other providers don’t show the same care and attention as JUNE, that we realise how important it is to shout about our strict processes.
Quality is something that is deeply entrenched in JUNE and there’s a good reason for that. We supply to surgeons, experts in a time-critical and hugely precise field where even the slightest mishap can mean life or death, and we know the effect that sending out faulty equipment or missing a delivery can have on our customers. Surgery is a significant event for all involved and, leading up to the procedure, everyone from the surgeon to the patient and their loved ones have prepared for the big day. At JUNE, we play our part by making sure that our surgical equipment is robust, durable and well packaged to help the process run smoothly.
Products built to last
Our quality begins with our products. Each material is carefully hand-picked and stringently tested for strength and durability.
The Galaxy II® – our lightweight self-retaining surgical retractor – was specifically designed to address surgeons’ concerns about cumbersome and outdated products. The quality of this system surpasses anything else seen on the market today, providing surgeons with easy single-handed positioning and a flexible, robust product that they can trust. And we look for that same level of care and attention to detail in all our products. For those that we distribute only, we often meet with the manufacturers to discuss quality control checks, ensuring that their standards align with our own. We also evaluate the products for ourselves before agreeing to distribute them, assessing their strength, robustness and appearance, so that we only put our name to products we truly believe in.
Certified quality
Wherever appropriate, we’re making sure we have the right regulatory stamp of approval for the quality standards we want to achieve. For example, the Galaxy II is manufactured and distributed from Great Britain, so is notified by the British Standards Institute (BSI) and, as a distributor, we are ISO 9001 certified. Our products all have the CE mark, which will soon transition to UKCA certification following Brexit[LB1] measures. We pay all of our distributed products the same due diligence, giving the manufacturers a comprehensive appraisal of their processes, and ensuring that they are ISO 13485 certified and notified by the relevant governing body in their geographical location.
Getting JUNE products to you
Our products arrive to us from all around the world, and are then shipped on for further transit, so we need to make sure that the quality is not compromised on this journey. Our products are well packaged and shipped by trusted couriers. A lot of care is taken in choosing the correct method of packaging for security, but also for sustainability. Our ‘ugly, but proud’ campaign reuses shipping boxes, even if they don’t look brand spanking new; a bit of old tape is no reason to throw a perfectly good box away when it doesn’t compromise the quality of our products inside, and helps us to reduce our impact on the planet. Look out for the ‘ugly, but proud’ sticker on our boxes!
There are some instances, however, where quality has to come before sustainability. For example, when customers order cartridges for the Thermablate™, the consumable is wrapped in a foil container to protect the integrity of the flexible balloon, before then being packaged in a cardboard box. This may look like overkill but it’s just another step that we take to ensure our products arrive as they are expected.
There are some instances, however, where quality has to come before sustainability. For example, when customers order cartridges for the Thermablate™, the consumable is wrapped in a foil container to protect the flexible balloon from drying out, before then being packaged in a cardboard box. This may look like overkill but it’s just another step that we take to ensure our products arrive as they are expected.
Eyes everywhere
We perform quality control checks on our products as soon as possible after they arrive at our warehouse, and often do this in pairs because two sets of eyes are always better than one! We begin with a visual check of the packaging: is it as we expected, is there any damage, are all of the boxes from the same lot number and labelled correctly? We need to make sure that the integrity of the package has not been breached during transit and, for anything that does appear damaged, we investigate further. At this point, we open up the shipping boxes to see inside, and compare the packing slip with the purchase order to check that we have the correct number of products. We then dig even deeper by opening 10 % of the packing boxes at random, taking care not to compromise the sterile blister packs. This gives us an opportunity to see the quality of the kits for ourselves, check the expiry date, evaluate the consistency and ensure that we are delivering on our promises. If all is well, products are boxed back up and sent on to our customers.
The ultimate check
Each comprehensive stage of quality control is important, but our greatest indicator of quality comes from our customers. The decisions we make as a company are guided by the honest feedback that we receive from real people using our products every day. We’re delighted to report that since our launch in 2018, not a single account has stopped using the Galaxy II, showing that all our efforts are worthwhile, and that JUNE Medical is a trusted and supported supplier of high-quality surgical equipment around the world.