Paul Hudson · CEO Hudson Printing Reporting from Drupa 2024

Intermountain Health isn't a printing company. It's an integrated healthcare network operating across Montana, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada — but within the organization sits a highly sophisticated print operation that produces everything from patient education materials to insurance, transactional, and member communications. With a team of just 17 caregivers, the operation combines high-volume inkjet, toner production, nearline finishing, redundancy, and increasingly automated workflows. But technology isn't the starting point. The team first asks what the organization needs, what should be produced internally, and only then decides which technology is the right tool for the job. And the economics are different. As an internal cost center, the objective isn't to maximize profit but to deliver the right quality, capacity, turnaround time, and cost while supporting an organization whose primary mission is treating patients. Investments are therefore measured by return, utilization, reliability, and the value they create for the wider healthcare system. After previously experiencing turnaround times of three to four weeks, investments in people, processes, inkjet, Tecnau finishing, and additional capacity have helped Intermountain Health bring production consistently down to just two to three days. In this INKISH film, we discuss automation, redundancy, equipment decisions, the importance of experienced operators, and why, even with increasingly advanced technology, the people running the equipment remain absolutely essential. And perhaps even more interestingly, Intermountain Health is now considering how its print infrastructure could potentially support other nonprofits and healthcare organizations — extending the value of its operation beyond its own network.