The Extent of Electronic Procurement Management Practices among Public Hospitals in the Southwestern Nigeria
This research investigated the extent of electronic procurement management practices among public hospitals in southwestern Nigeria. The study employed descriptive cross-sectional research design. Primary data were gathered through administration of questionnaire and interview guide. The Population of the study was 240 respondents with a sample size of 168 purposively selected from public hospitals in Southwestern Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling technique was adopted for the study. First stage used a census survey to select 30 public hospitals comprising Federal Medical Centers, Specialist Hospitals and University Teaching Hospitals in the six states of the Southwestern Nigeria. In the second stage, 21 hospitals from 4 states of Lagos, Ogun, Ondo and Ekiti were purposively selected. These States were selected because of the presence of the three categories of hospitals purposively selected for this study. The third stage involved the selection of respondents from the units such as: account, internal audit, store, ICT, procurement office, general administration, pharmacy and procurement committee chair in each of the 21 hospitals purposively selected for this study totaling 168 respondents. Data obtained were analysed using mean and standard deviation. The study's findings showed that majority of the selected public hospitals in southwestern Nigeria embraced e-procurement modules investigated in this study on average, as indicated by their mean values and standard deviation in order of their rank: e-payment, e-ordering, cataloging, e-tendering, e-sourcing on a scale of 5.0. The study concluded that public hospitals in the southwestern Nigeria had deployed e-procurement but; to a small proportion, nonetheless creating more awareness among…