Resilience in Public Healthcare Supply Chain Management: A Scoping Review from Indian Perspective

Abstract Background: Public healthcare supply chain management (SCM) in India plays a vital role in ensuring the availability of essential medicines to the population. The COVID-19 pandemic revealed significant challenges, including inadequate infrastructure, fragmented supply chains (SCs), and logistical inefficiencies. Central and state agencies encountered difficulties due to the absence of resilience mechanisms to address SC disruptions. Resilience in the SCs is the need of the hour to protect against unprecedented future crises. Therefore, evidence on the resilience techniques used to make public healthcare procurement and SCM resilient in the Indian context must be gathered. Objective: To systematically summarize key resilience techniques used to make public healthcare SCM resilient in the context of India. Materials and Methods: We conducted a systematic search of electronic databases and gray literature to identify studies on resilience strategies in SCM from 1990 to 2021. The PRISMA flowchart documented the study selection process. Data extraction captured study design, authorship, publication years, origin, and resilience techniques integrated into SC operations. Results: Thirty-seven relevant records were reviewed and analyzed. After considering the eligibility criteria, nine records were included. Two studies presented strategies such as digital supply networks and interpretive structural modeling (ISM)-analytic network processes for enhancing resilience across all five SC stages. Another study introduced the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and multi-criteria decision-making techniques to bring resilience to the distribution process. Three articles focused on using ISM, the Markov chain model, and multi-supplier inventory system techniques to boost resilience in the distribution process. Another study suggested the SC operations reference strategy to improve procurement and distribution resilience. Lastly, one study proposed using radio frequency identification to strengthen resilience in storage and distribution processes. Conclusion: The review outlined key strategies to enhance SC resilience in India, including various models and approaches for managing disruptions at different stages. However, practical implementation may involve significant costs and expertise.