Knowledge Center

This paper will define the regulation and explore how a supply chain department can support their organization in meeting this aspect of the regulations. Understanding the alphabet soup of acronyms that is Unique Device Identifier (UDI), their meaning, how to understand and read the standardized labeling are crucial first steps. Organizations should able to identify what defines an implant.

This case study provides a review of Grady Health System’s transformation from traditional Value Analysis Joint Product Review Team structure to Value Based Selection Committees which promote shared governance including system wide physicians and executives focusing on full integration of cost, quality, outcomes analysis to ensure selection of products offering the greatest overall value for cost reduction and improvement of outcomes.

In 2014, AHRMM hosted the first Cost, Quality, and Outcomes (CQO) Summit to bring healthcare thought leaders together and discuss particular supply chain issues and concerns. The results of those conversations were used to develop the first task force and to shape the agenda for the second CQO Summit, held in 2015.

Increasing federal regulation compliance costs and declining reimbursements have compressed hospital profitability. This is leading hospitals to turn to Supply Chain to reduce direct costs for supplies, devices, drugs, and purchased services. Traditionally Supply Chain has aggressively pursued these cost reductions through price reduction tactics. These techniques, however, are yielding diminishing savings returns.

This paper describes the development of a multidisciplinary and innovative product conversion process at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (DFCI) in Boston, Massachusetts, when the existing process for changing products was dysfunctional.

This paper explores nine different methods of replenishing a hospital storage area and compares and contrasts the steps nursing must progress through to retrieve the supplies they need for their patients.  

The Purpose of this white paper is to prepare Supply Chain professionals to better understand how to support navigating some of the risks and opportunities inherent in participating in the 340B Drug Discount Program.

This paper explores the application of the Baldrige Excellence Framework to the health care supply chain. Specifically, the paper will explore the reasons that the Baldrige Framework might be used to evaluate and improve supply chain systems and processes. An examination of the need of a systems perspective will be followed by a brief overview of the Baldrige program.

On August 8, 2011, the Association for Health Care Resource & Materials Management hosted an Executive Thought Leader Event, sponsored by VHA. Held during the AHRMM11 Conference in Boston, Massachusetts, 26 seasoned healthcare supply chain executives discussed a broad range of strategic issues and challenges confronting supply chain executives today.

Incorporating the targets for transformation set by the leader of our organization including unjustified variation, fragmentation of care-giving, perverse payment incentives, and the patient as a passive receipt of care, Supply Chain has developed a strategic model and plan that transforms our thinking from a focus on “chains” to a focus on “flow” and from “Supply Chain Services” to “Care Support Services.”

This white paper was written as a recap of the AHRMM15 Cost, Quality, and Outcomes (CQO) Summit, held in August of 2015. The paper, which is split into four parts, opens with a review of the CQO Movement and description of activities conducted since its inception in 2013.

This paper provides a case-study on what Banner has done to implement and continuously improve this initiative. Three key components to successful supply utilization savings are reviewed.

Purchasing in healthcare is largely based on a hierarchical management style. In an experimental case started in 2004, at Floyd Medical Center in Rome, Georgia, this standard was altered. The introduction of a team concept combined with lean manufacturing practices to this traditional purchasing setting was unique. The results of this radical change over the past eight years have been exceptional. The paper describes the steps taken to change the culture, the actions taken to implement lean tools, and the wins achieved by the team.

The surgical instrument management software (SIM) implementation began in October of 2003 and a Lean initiative to redesign processes began in October 2005. Implementation of all the initial recommendations was not complete until June of 2006.

This paper will present health care procurement strategies of four countries - the United States, Botswana, the United Kingdom, and China - as a means to evaluate volume aggregation under different health care delivery models.  

Dale L. Locklair, FAHRMM, CMRP Vice President of Procurement and Construction McLeod Health Florence, SC

Increasingly, the hospital and health care delivery system executives are viewing the supply chain as a strategic asset that can be leveraged to meet operational, clinical, and financial performance imperatives. This has not always been the case. For years, the supply chain was seen as little more than a necessary but ancillary function – to buy and deliver products as needed – with the primary supply chain improvement strategy focused on buying those products at the lowest price possible.

The purpose of this paper is to share lessons learned and successes in contract management. Five years ago, Contract Management consisted of signing a few Letters of Commitment through our Group Purchasing Organization and trying to keep track of them in a three ring notebook.

The initial purpose for developing a socially responsible, closed loop supply chain was to enhance our environmentally sustainable practices by purchasing more responsible and locally sourced products.