SPECIAL FOCUS
CentraCare Health may represent an integrated delivery network (IDN) that operates eight hospitals serving the rural communities in central, west central and southwest Minnesota but it performs as keenly as a well-oiled suburban system. CentraCare’s facilities, spread throughout a sprawling area, recognized early on the value centralizing supply chain operations among its systemization strat- egy of evolving as a single, cohesive enterprise. Within that “com- mon culture,” CentraCare emphasizes “consistent collaboration” between its supply chain sectional duopoly with Contracting & Procurement (negotiating, selecting, sourcing, procuring and data management) working parallel with Logistics (perpetual inventory management, unit-level supply chain management, receiving and couriering), aligned by contract categories in a model that makes sense for the organization type. They centralized their enterprise resource planning (ERP) system to Oracle, which has fueled growth in electronic ordering, replenishment and work ow management, but also retained bar-coded two-bin Kanban PAR locations. They are specializing in purchased services, which they call “strategic services,” and are widely regarded as the system’s “contracting experts” from the C-suite on down. They even actively participate in provider recruitment, working with physician candidates from the beginning on supply chain protocols.
Cone Health, Greensboro, NC
www.conehealth.com
he Supply Chain team specifi cally Clinical alue nalysis and Strategic Sourcing – at Cone Health didn’t wait for the pandemic in early 2020 to develop a system-wide quality improvement process. They implemented it three years earlier, using Hurricane Maria hitting Puerto Rico in 2017 and disrupting supply lines, to reinforce that business as usual going forward would be most unusual. Working with clinicians and administrators they devel- oped the “Product Disruption Tracker” whereby Supply Chain, pharmacists, physicians and nurses worked together to identify and locate product alternatives when crises or disasters threat- ened access for their hospitals and outpatient clinics. They set up a color-coded product-related warning methodology as a com- munication mechanism and established a “Product Availability Alert” system they would during the next several years to deal with product shortages due to manufacturing issues (including raw materials access, sterilization challenges) and also to source personal protective equipment (PPE) and assist in purchasing decisions and staff education during the pandemic. The Product Disruption Decision Committee developed a vendor vetting process to ensure that products are certifi ed and verifi able from alternative, non-traditional supplier pools. To infuse the process with some levity, they would hold PPE fashion shows to test and demonstrate PPE comfort levels of new products.
Ochsner Lafayette (LA) General
Medical Center
ochsnerlg.org
Ochsner Lafayette not only had to contend with the pandemic aftershocks, but also an “incredibly active” hurricane season and “record-breaking” freezes to ensure its facilities maintain
access to needed products and a eible supply chain. Ochsner afayette also served as a CO- vaccine storage and dis- tribution hub for the region as well as a vaccination center for a community of tens of thousands overseen in part by Supply Chain and Pharmacy leadership. This involved detailed planning for vaccine receipts and adequate storage, including the requi- site freezers. The facility also forged supply chain partnerships with three oil and gas suppliers in the region to piggyback on commodity ordering to fi ll supplemental gaps for PPE products and other essential supplies. Supply Chain relied on its infection prevention specialists to help determine the quality of products brought in from alternative suppliers to meet demand spikes. Through it all, they were able to expand and open additional community clinics to serve patients.
Penn State Health, Hershey, PA
www.pennstatehealth.org
s the pandemic caused raw fi ll rates to plunge to to , Penn State worked out a sweet deal to house all of the additional product Supply Chain would have to procure. Penn State part- nered with nearby Hershey Foods, which donated 22,000 square feet of new warehouse space, along with six full-time employees who worked at the Chocolate World warehouse. Thanks to this infusion of space and talent, Penn State’s Supply Chain team was able to get the new warehouse operation up and running within nine days to store such essential items as disinfectant wipes, hand sanitizer and PPE. This also enabled Supply Chain to concentrate on sourcing products and maintaining safety stock for physician practices and critical items for the hospitals and clinics. This included a -day safety stock and a -day pandemic stock to pro- vide some slack should backorders and shortages tighten supply lines. They also were able to support an additional 245 long-term care and extended care facilities in south central Pennsylvania with their supply chain needs.
Sentara Healthcare, Norfolk, VA
www.sentara.com
Through a series of provider partnerships, collaborating with physicians and surgical staff to clinically integrate supply chain with demonstrated outcome measures, and using group pur- chasing contracts, Sentara is booking more than $31 million in supply chain and pharmacy savings in 2021. Working with two other provider systems they have built a process that concen- trates on specifi c commodities and service lines to drive greater contractual savings. They also are improving purchased services sourcing and contracting to enable more effi cient regionalied support and service metrics throughout the enterprise. Sentara has implemented a more progressive supply chain platform, starting with a dedicated Supplier Diversity Executive Council chaired by the system’s Supply Chain leader. They are targeting million in spending to go to qualifi ed smaller, minority-owned and managed and veteran-owned and managed suppliers. They also are providing quarterly educational sessions for smaller suppliers to help them operate more effectively and effi ciently with requests for proposals and other supply chain-related transactions, tactics and strategies.
hpnonline.com • HEALTHCARE PURCHASING NEWS • December 2021 9
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