LTC PPE Reorder Planning: What a 120-Bed Ontario Home Consumes in a Month

The quick answer for a 120-bed Ontario long-term care home is that gloves dominate the monthly order, isolation gowns are the line that swings hardest, and a reorder point is more useful than an annual forecast. The table below models a month of consumption from per-resident-day assumptions: 4.5 pairs of gloves, 0.35 isolation gowns, 1.5 masks and 4.0 incontinence briefs per resident per day. Everything in it is a modelling estimate built from stated ratios, not an audit of any home's records. The point is the arithmetic, so you can drop your own ratios in and get your own order.

What Should a 120-Bed Home Keep on Hand?

Start from the two numbers that actually drive stock: resident census and hands-on care episodes per resident per day. Census is 120. Care episodes vary by acuity, by outbreak status and by how much of the day is high-contact personal care.

Multiplying the census by a per-resident-day ratio gives the daily draw, and the daily draw multiplies into the month:

• Gloves: 120 beds × 4.5 gloves per bed-day = 540 gloves per day
• Isolation gowns: 120 × 0.35 = 42 gowns per day
• Level 3 masks: 120 × 1.5 = 180 masks per day
• Incontinence briefs: 120 × 4.0 = 480 briefs per day

Those four lines, not the whole storeroom, are what a reorder plan usually has to defend, because they are the lines that empty fastest during a respiratory season or a declared outbreak.

How Do You Turn Per-Resident-Day Use Into a Monthly Order?

A 30-day month is the convenient planning month for consumables, and a 31-day month adds 3.3% on top. Use 30 days for the baseline, then sanity-check against the calendar at order time.

Read the table as a model. The glove line assumes 9.0 individual gloves per resident-day, which is the 4.5 pairs figure, and at 100 per box that is 162 boxes a month. The briefs line is the largest by pack count because briefs are changed several times a day per resident, not once. If your home runs 5.5 pairs of gloves per resident-day instead, the glove line moves to 198 boxes, a 22% jump on the same census — which is why the ratio, not the census, is the thing to keep current.

Two of these lines are nonwoven barrier products with published barrier ratings, so match the level to the task before you fix the ratio. The SMS Level 2 isolation gowns, 40 gsm, 50 pack are the routine-care line in the table above, and the explanation of the AAMI Level 2 barrier rating sets out what that level does and does not cover. Where a lighter garment is enough, the Level 1 non-woven fluid-resistant isolation gowns are the lower-barrier option.

When Should the Reorder Point Trigger?

The workable rule is lead time plus review interval, plus a buffer. If your supplier lead time is five working days and you review stock once a week, the shelf has to survive twelve days of draw before the next delivery lands. Take the daily figure for each line and multiply by twelve:

• Gloves: 540 per day × 12 = 6,480 gloves, or about 65 boxes, as the trigger point
• Gowns: 42 per day × 12 = 504 gowns, or about 10 packs
• Briefs: 480 per day × 12 = 5,760 briefs, or 96 packs

Those are the levels at which the order should already be raised, not the levels at which the shelf is empty. Because these are modelled figures, the trigger should be set against measured issue data once a home has four to six weeks of its own counts.

Why Does Isolation Gown Consumption Swing So Much?

Gown use is episodic. Routine care draws a steady trickle, and then a single declared respiratory or enteric outbreak moves the same census onto contact precautions, where every entry to a resident room consumes a gown. The ratio does not drift by 10%; it multiplies.

The planning consequence is a split stock position: a base level sized on routine use, plus a reserved outbreak allocation that is not spent on routine days. Homes that merge the two tend to hit the reserved level in ordinary weeks and then discover they have nothing held back. The same logic applies to the glove line, where outbreak status lifts consumption per resident-day without changing the census at all.

For a worked spend review on this exact problem, the case review of Ontario long-term care isolation gown spend shows how the ratios translate into a purchasing story, and the Ottawa long-term care isolation gown supply maths case review walks a second scenario. Regulatory context for Ontario homes sits in the review of Ontario care home infection prevention duties, and the comparison of Ontario and United States long-term care oversight covers how duties are split across the border.

Related reading

• Case review: Ontario LTC isolation gown spend
• Ottawa LTC isolation gown supply math case review
• B2B wholesale collection

Ordering for a clinic, lab or care home? Wholesale and multi-site ordering covers case pricing and account setup, and the B2B wholesale collection lists the lines stocked for institutional buyers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is the monthly table an audit of typical Ontario homes?

No. It is a modelling estimate built from per-resident-day ratios stated in this article, and no audit data is claimed. Substitute your own measured ratios and the arithmetic produces your own order quantities.

How often should the per-resident-day ratios be updated?

Review them monthly for the first few months, then seasonally. Ratios move with acuity mix and with outbreak status, and an outbreak can multiply gown and glove use without any change in census.

Does a higher glove ratio always mean a bigger order?

Not necessarily. A change in how gloves are issued at the bedside can lower the ratio without changing care. Measure the ratio, then look at what drives it before you simply order more.

Should outbreak stock be stored with routine stock?

Keep it separate and labelled. Merging the two makes the reserved level disappear in ordinary weeks, which is exactly when it is needed least and appears least urgent to replace.

CliniEco Medical is a licensed medical device establishment (MDEL #35334).