Bill Adkins, President of National X-Ray Corporation, based in Palmetto, Fla. has a 5,000 square foot warehouse for parts, but has seen a drop in sales over the past two years on equipment.

"Two years ago it was just incredible," Adkins says. "Before OEC had their problem, we would get a truck load of C-arms a month. At any given time I could have 20 to 25 C-arms in the shop. Now, we're talking a handful. The used market is still not back to where it used to be. Our volume has dropped drastically since the OEC shutdown. The amount of used C-arms in the marketplace has been reduced quite a bit in the past two years."


GE resuming shipment of C-arms has increased the supply of used systems available, decreasing the wholesale price to pre-shutdown levels.

"Since the gates have been opened up with OEC there's been a good influx of good equipment and prices have come down substantially. That's good for everyone," Serros says.

Russ Surratt, President of Bighorn Biomedical Services, Inc. in Wyoming isn't so sure. While the company has done anywhere from 60 to 120 C-arm refurbishments in the last five years, he sees GE's return as a bad thing for business.

"When OEC was down we sold a whole bunch and now that they are delivering again, we aren't selling as many," he says. "OEC is doing everything they can to get business so that includes price and offering a much better warranty."

Surratt's business is concentrating on the vascular and mini C-arms for now, but once GE is cleared to distribute those, he expects another drop.

The economic crisis has also played a role in the refurbished market. You might think that people looking to save money would be good for the refurbished market, which offers prices at as much as 70% cheaper than new, but the financial uncertainty has been felt by all.

"It seems like the smaller clinics do not have the money to spend or are just unwilling to part with it," says Adkins. "Many doctors that I know have personally lost quite a bit in the stock market; therefore they appear to not be willing to risk their remaining funds even on their own business."

The refurb process

Amber Diagnostics sold about 80 to 100 refurbished C-arms last year, and have a very stringent refurbishing process.

"When it first comes in, we do proper inventory and assessment of the machine. From that point, it gets disinfected and is totally stripped down with all major components taken off the machine and disinfected again because of blood and other things," Serros says. "From that point, they are sanded, prepped, primed, painted, re-decaled, and replacement parts are added and reassemble. We add upgrade features and replace worn parts and then put it back together and we do a burn in where we try to make it not work and put it under the most stressful circumstances. When it passes that portion, we take it through quality control measures."

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