Methodist Hospital Recognized Nationally for Supply Chain Excellence
The mission of Methodist Hospital is to provide safe, compassionate, high-quality, and cost effective health care to the people of our community. In keeping with this mission, Methodist constantly strives to maximize services while reducing costs. One method of achieving this goal is to evaluate and adjust supply expenses. Chief Operating Officer for Methodist Hospital, Wayne Meriwether, says, Other than our labor expense, supplies represent the second largest cost center at the hospital. Thats why controlling supply expense is so important.
In July, Methodist Hospital partnered with Premier, Inc., a healthcare alliance consisting of 2,200 U.S. hospitals and more than 63,000 related health care entities, and began participating in the Accelerated Supply Chain Endeavor (ASCEND) program and its sister component, MySpend. These programs help hospitals achieve and sustain rapid improvements in supply chain performance as well as identify opportunities to reduce overall supply expenses. The cost savings realized through the Premier programs benefits the Methodist Hospital organization but more importantly, is passed on to the patient through a decrease in overall hospital costs.
Mr. Meriwether says the impetus for participating in the Premier program was to increase the purchasing and negotiating power of Methodist while simultaneously decreasing the financial burden placed upon our patients for needed supplies. Participating in Premiers ASCEND and MySpend programs enables us to be good stewards of our resources and continue providing safe, compassionate, high-quality health care to our community, he says.
In December 2009, Methodist Hospitals successful effort to reduce supply expenses was featured in a national press release distributed by Premier. Twice recognized by Premier with the Supply Chain Excellence Award, Methodist Hospital was used as a case study to illustrate how hospitals could achieve significant cost savings through simplified purchasing processes, appropriate clinical utilization, and specially negotiated contracts. By using Premiers ASCEND program, Methodist was able to reduce supply expenses as a percent of operating revenue from 13.46 percent to 12.17 percent in September of 2009, and to 9.14 percent by the end of October.
For more information on the hospitals efforts to control supply expenses through the Premier programs, please contact Ashley Sides, Manager of Marketing and P.R. at (270) 831-7836 or asides@methodisthospital.net.
