In a business where you supply items for people with various medical problems, caring about customers probably is the most important trait that can be shown.
On the business cards and stationery at Interwest Medical Equipment Distributors Inc., 235 E. 6100 South, these words appear: "professionals who care."This motto has had a big impact on the success of Interwest Medical. President James E. Robinson and his staff have turned the business into a six-store operation since it was spun off from a business operated by his father, J. Calvin Robinson, in 1982.
Robinson is quick to share the plaudits for whatever success Interwest Medical has had with major stockholders Lee Ericson, who is the company vice president, and Val Christianson, who is operations officer and secretary. Robinson also has three other minor stockholders.
Creation of Interwest Medical could best be characterized an accident because Robinson originally wanted to be an attorney.
But, then again, with Robinson's family history of operating a medical supply store, it isn't hard to understand why Robinson is where he is now.
Robinson's connection to the medical supply business goes back to his grandfather, James F. Robinson, who purchased a business in 1941 that had three segments: a pharmacy, a wholesale physician's and hospital supply; and a retail outlet called Robinson's Medical Mart, which developed from the wholesale supply.
Located at 333 S. Main, Jim can remember as a boy watching the Days of '47 Parade while sitting on boards put between two ladders in front of Robinson's Medical Mart. His father let him clean some rental equipment, make minor repairs, straighten shelves, check in merchandise and later when he could drive made some deliveries.
"I got a kick out of helping people," Jim said. "Old people were really grateful for what I did for them." That might be the reason for the motto on the business cards and stationery.
At that time he didn't think about making the health equipment business his life's work.
In 1969, Jim started at BYU, but that was interrupted by a two-year mission in northern California for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. When he came back from his mission, his intent was to be an attorney but changed his mind, and in his second semester of an intermediate accounting program, a professor suggested he change majors.
So, he entered BYU's first master of accountancy program that was preparation to becoming a certified public accountant and graduated in 1975 in the first class. He spent two years in San Francisco with the accounting firm of Deloitte Haskins and Sells (now Delloitte & Touche) and received some offers for employment.
Jim returned to Salt Lake City in 1977 to attend a wedding for a sister, and his father asked him to join Robinson's Medical Mart, which had been moved to 409 E. 400 South. Jim took a month to decide and moved to Salt Lake City in July 1977. While learning the business, Jim took over the accounting functions of the business.
The Robinsons developed a growth strategy and opened a store at 235 E. 6100 South, and the company moved into the medical rehabilitation equipment arena. In 1980, his father decided to expand the uniform part of the medical mart, and the company also joined Medical Equipment Distributors Inc., a corporation consisting of independent medical equipment dealers having a main emphasis in supplying equipment for rehabilitation.
Jim said MED was formed in 1968 by five businessmen in large metropolitan areas where Vietnam veterans congregated. The veterans said the wheelchairs on the market at that time didn't meet their needs, so MED members developed wheelchairs that can be activated by voice or by moving the eyelids.
In 1981, Robinson's Medical Mart abandoned a uniform branch store after seven months of operation with losses of $150,000. On Oct. 1, 1982, Jim spun off Interwest Medical after a difference in philosophies over long-term goals and established Interwest Medical with headquarters at the Murray location.
Interwest doesn't sell uniforms but instead concentrates on respiratory equipment such as home ventilators; rehabilitation equipment; modification of vans so paraplegics can drive; modification of homes so people in wheelchairs can get around; and home care equipment such as hospital beds, commodes, wheelchairs, bathroom items and walking aids.
Now employing 65 people, Interwest Medical also has stores in Pleasant Grove, Ogden, Price, Boise and Pocatello, Idaho. Two of the employees are handicapped, and they offer insight on the problems they face and what equipment they can use so Interwest Medical can provide what customers want.
The future looks rosy for companies like Interwest Medical because of the trend for short hospital stays and rehabilitation and home use of items either sold or rented.
One obstacle in that rosy future appears to be the federal government, which is the largest purchaser of medical equipment. Although home care is chosen over hospital care for Medicare patients, the money provided for home care hasn't increased.
Jim said that early in this decade the Medicare Health Care Financing Administration changed its computer programs, and companies like Interwest Medical weren't getting paid in a timely manner.
That prompted him to become actively involved nationally in MED for which he has been a board member since 1985 and chairman of the board since 1988. He also is treasurer of the National Association of Medical Equipment Suppliers and has served on the executive committee since 1986.
NAMES pushed for legislation in Congress to overhaul the health equipment payment plan that was passed in late 1987 and implemented last January. After one year, Jim said the plan is working in some areas, but there still are problems in others.
In Utah, there was a 30 percent decrease in the amount equipment suppliers receive through Medicare. HCFA also eliminated a purchase option for equipment and tried to take $200 million from the medical equipment fund that Jim claims would have caused massive bankruptcies in the medical equipment supplier industry.
"You can't expect a supplier to give someone a new wheelchair every few years," he said.
In spite of some of the problems with the federal government, the medical equipment supply industry is growing, and it's the result of companies like Interwest Medical and MED and its effort to market new technology and provide what people want in health care.
At Interwest Medical, customers can find anything they want in health care supplies and even a few things you might not think of. For example, there is an electric-powered chair that lifts people up stairs, customized vans with hand controls so paraplegics can drive, elevators for the home so handicapped people can get up and down stairs and motorized wheelchairs that operate just by head movements.
Other items are manual wheelchairs, children's wheelchairs, bathroom aids, orthopedic supports, support hosiery, canes, walkers, urological supplies, first-aid items, crutches, toys and therapy equipment. Interwest also refills oxygen bottles and rents and sells ventilators to assist people in breathing.
About 50 percent of the company's business is rental, and a staff is continually working on keeping the rental equipment repaired and clean for the next customer.
Jim is proud that his company was the first health equipment company west of the Mississippi River to be accredited by the Joint Commission on Healthcare Organizations.
The accreditation probably was the result of the slogan on the business cards and stationery. But there are other slogans floating around the company such as "satisfaction is not achieved until it is perceived;" "service is an attitude, not a department"; and "people don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care."