Work Out When to Reorder Wound-Care Supplies — Free, From Lead Times Not Shelf Space
Dressings are ordered by whoever notices the shelf is low, which is the week after it needed to be ordered. Lead time is the variable nobody tracks, and a two-week lead time on a dressing used daily is a shortage you have already committed to.
The proof surface
Free path: the tool computes locally in this browser with no key and no account. Where an AI step helps, any free chat assistant works — free tiers exist (Google AI Studio, Groq), but plans and limits change, so check the provider's own page. No third-party service is claimed here as verified: UNCONFIRMED — model has no browsing access this session.
Why the flat version breaks
A shelf check tells you how much is left, not when a decision is due. The same six boxes are comfortable with a three-day lead time and already late with a fourteen-day one. Dating each item from its own usage rate and lead time is what turns a shelf check into a schedule.
How to use the wound-care supply binder in four passes
Boxes, packs, ampoules — whatever the order form uses. Counting in loose dressings and ordering in boxes is the most common way the numbers drift out of step with the shelf.
Take the last month's usage and divide by four. A dressing change every three days is 2.3 a week; a guess of 'about one a day' doubles the order and hides the real shortage.
If the last order took sixteen days, enter sixteen. The binder is only useful if it dates the decision from the delay you actually get.
Items past their reorder date are already late. Write the delivery date on the sheet when it arrives and use that as the lead time next month — the binder gets more accurate each cycle.
SAMPLE DATA, NOT A VERIFIED CLAIM: the starter record is a community nursing caseload with six supplies, three different lead times and a fourteen-day item that is already behind. Replace these values with your own source before you rely on anything.
What breaks first
Ordering by how empty the shelf looks
A nearly empty shelf of a fast-moving item with a two-day lead time is fine; a half-full shelf of a slow-moving item with a three-week lead time is the emergency. The sort is by date for that reason.
Using the supplier's advertised lead time
Advertised lead times are the best case, often excluding dispatch and weekends. The binder needs the number you have lived through, even if it is embarrassing for the supplier.
Rounding weekly use down to whole units
Half a dressing a week over a year is twenty-six dressings. Rounding 1.5 down to 1 under-orders by a third and shows up as a shortage in the third month.
What you pay otherwise
| The usual route | What it leaves out | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Emergency ordering | Next-day courier rates on a routine item because the date was missed | 2–3× the normal price |
| Keeping three months of everything | Cash and cupboard space tied up in stock that expires | over-ordering every line |
| A stock-management system | Monthly licence for a caseload that fits on one sheet | $20–$80 a month |
| This page + the free wound-care supply binder | Computed in your tab, result on screen before you type anything | $0 |
Try the free wound-care supply binder right here
Load the starter caseload and change a lead time from 5 to 21 days to watch the order date jump backwards.
FIRST-LOAD · sample record filed
Take it into the free wound-care supply binder
The companion app runs the same logic with a numbered intake, three starter records, a stateful share link, the one-time printable layer, and the local history shelf.
Open the free wound-care supply binder →Keep the work if you will use it again
The full dated binder: every supply with its cover in days, order date and flag, plus the review date and lead-time note, unlimited re-runs.
The on-screen result is free and complete. The one-time layer adds a tangible file you keep and the saved history that comes with it.
Boundary: This schedules ordering from numbers you enter; it is not clinical or procurement advice, it does not verify supplier lead times or stock, and it does not decide how much of a dressing a wound needs. Wound care decisions and quantities belong to the treating clinician.