Like most home care equipment manufacturers, CHAD Therapeutics, Chatsworth, Calif, has two clients—the home care provider and the patient. In the competitive oxygen market, the company has struck a balance between meeting the needs of these two groups and its bottom line. Dealer/Provider spoke with Tom Jones, president and CEO of Chad Therapeutics, about how the company meets these challenges.

Q What factors do you consider when introducing a new product?
A We introduce new products to improve patient care and help reduce our customer’s cost of doing business. Both those elements go into our design and thought process when bringing a new product to market.

Q What bottom line factors do you need to take into account?
A In our case, the primary factors are competition and cost, because you have got to make a profit on it. One could sit back and say that the value of the product to the end user is high, but if the competition is selling a similar or equal product for a lower price, then even though the end user value is high, you are not going to get that much of a selling price for it.

Q How do you provide customer service?
A In addition to our high quality products, we believe the other thing we have to offer that can distinguish us from others is our customer service. Everything from getting the product to the home care provider on time to following it up with the right kind of telephone and, if necessary, person-to-person contact.

Q How have changes in Medicare affected you?
A Of course, most of the cost containment does not affect us directly because we are not providing products to patients. We really are providing products to home care providers, who in turn provide those products to patients. It does affect us in the case where home care providers are squeezed by reimbursement reductions. In the case of something like the TOTAL O2 system, the biggest feature is the reduction in life cycle cost to the home care provider because it eliminates the majority of home deliveries. In effect, we are helping them to dramatically reduce their operating costs.

www.chadtherapeutics.com;   (800) 423-8870.

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