Worth
PEOPLE & OPINIONS
Repeating
Backdoor buying meets
“Customers are starting to see true
savings from a freight management
perspective. Healthcare facilities see a
software match
very rapid, positive ROI with minimal
investments of time and resources
[when] using a freight management
Beaumont takes hand-off approach to bill-only
company.”
transactions
Doug Schwieger, director of marketing
and product development,
by T.D. Suchowski
OptiFreight Logistics
“With little to no standards govern-
ing third-party repair companies, it
F
rustrated by the seemingly limitless
list of implantable products parading
into surgical suites as post-consump-
is important to thoroughly evalu-
tion bill-only purchase order items?
ate your repair vendor to ensure
Like many healthcare supply chain execu-
patient safety and enforce bottom-
tives around the nation, Renee Bouren, di-
line sa
PEOPLE & OPINIONS
vings.” rector, materials management, and Chuck
Derek Lashua, marketing director,
Carson, administrative director, supply
Spectrum Surgical Instruments Corp.
chain, at Royal Oak, MI-based Beaumont
Hospitals, certainly felt that way. A regional,
“It’s critical that hand-sanitizing and
integrated health network, Beaumont is com-
Photo courtesy Beaumont Hospitals
prised of 3 hospitals totaling 1,711 patient Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak
soap products are chosen to be effec-
beds, medical centers, nursing homes, rehab
tive but also to be non-drying to sup-
facilities and hundreds of physician offices. formal for such a large spend and left the
port skin health, so that healthcare
“We always looked at spine, orthopedics hospital exposed from a pricing and audit/
providers don’t mind using it.”
and cardiology transactions as high-risk ar- control standpoint,” commented Carson.
Cheryl Littau, PhD, senior program
eas,” Bouren said. “These items account for In order to compile quantifiable data on
leader skincare product development,
nearly $30M or 20% of our entire supply their current state, Beaumont’s supply chain
Ecolab
budget and for a long time we were asking, team conducted a three-month retrospective
‘Can somebody help us with this?’” invoice evaluation focusing solely on ortho-
“Lean and Six Sigma use CQI and
Beaumont’s search spanned several years pedic items from just two vendors. “We com-
TQM principles, and all of these pro-
and several product trials. “We had been pared the vendor’s invoices with what our
looking for an application that could auto- pricing should have been based on the con-
grams intend to make businesses
mate bill-only transactions, specifically for tracts we had for those products,” Bouren
more effective and efficient. But I see
orthopedic and spine implants,” she noted. recalled. “We found an $80,000 discrepancy
the main differences being that Six
“But there was no one application that met in that three-month period. Based on that in-
Sigma is more rigorous than these
the criteria that we thought we needed.” formation, we went forward to find some-
others because it requires involve- Bouren indicated that the variability of thing that could help us contain those costs.”
ment from administration, and it pricing for implantable products and acces- Ultimately, Beaumont chose a Web-based
employs a disciplined approach of
sories and their procedure-based delivery solution, BlackTie Medical’s HandOff ser-
management with facts and data.”
process warranted the need for software sup- vice, which allowed for the customization
port. “Not only are these products consigned they needed.
Molly Ehrlich, CMRP, SSGB, implementa-
or walked in by the vendor representatives, “We wanted a system that would comple-
tion manager, VHA Performance
there are literally thousands and thousands ment our Oracle platform by storing contract
Services, VHA Inc.
of different pricing scenarios that arise when pricing, managing the receipt/requisition/
physicians are implanting these products. approval workflow and get the PO back to
“Our OR manager has 24/7 manage-
Our contracts make extensive use of capita- the vendor,” Carson said. “Contract price
ment responsibility for our OR. We’re
tions, so we were dealing with a constant management is the most critical element that
certainly not a static market. The challenge of documenting utilization and we wanted to get under control. We want
dynamics of who we are, what we
correctly pricing products on POs.” these vendor agreements to be competitive,
do and how we do it are always
Absent a technological solution, implant and they are very complex – more than our
changing, and there’s even been
coordinators in the operating room would MMIS [materials management information
evolving expectations from the pa-
rely heavily on the vendor reps to document system] could effectively manage. BlackTie’s
tients we serve.”
what products were used and what pricing HandOff solution ‘super-charges’ our MMIS
– line item or capitation – applied, according by electronically storing our pricing and by
Becky Stewart, assistant vice president
to Bouren. Her team then would check with having functionality to track and manage
of surgical services, St. David’s Medical
the OR record to confirm utilization, type req- complex pricing such as capitations, rebates,
Center, Austin, TX
uisition into the MMIS, give the vendor a PO levels, etc.”
and complete a receipt. “We had numerous Carson credited HandOff for improving
discussions that this process was far too in- Beaumont’s PO process by fully automating
60 November 2009 • HEALTHCARE PURCHASING NEWS
www.hpnonline.com
0911-PnP(BlackTie)-short.JA edit.pmd 60 10/14/2009, 9:27 AM
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