Author Archives: Tom Finn

At last week’s Healthcare Information Management Systems Society Conference (HIMSS), technology and medical professionals mainly focused on three areas of advancement and supply chain risk: the latest in telemedicine, the related consumer-driven payment platforms and cybersecurity for connected medical devices.

The Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative (HGPII)’s 2019 annual Public Accountability Report released Thursday found that healthcare's group purchasing organizations (GPOs) continue to advance business practices that promote growth, transparency and innovation. The annual report also explored the sector's ethics.

The hospital market in the U.S. is undergoing a significant transformation at all levels. Rapidly consolidating markets, declining revenues and a fundamentally new reimbursement paradigm that links provider payments to improved performance are the current headliners. The latter is a value-based form of reimbursement that holds healthcare providers accountable for both the cost and quality of the care they provide. It’s a data-driven payment system that will reward the best-performing providers and penalize those that don’t measure up. Almost by definition, it’s a system where data accuracy and transparency have become the essential currency for improved decision making.

Traditional silos are giving way to cross functional collaborations, as the clinically integrated supply chain compels it.

In this final installment of our three-part series on Prodigo Solutions, we not only address how the company is helping to solve healthcare’s data standards challenge, but how it has successfully positioned itself to directly support the industry’s drive to clinically integrate its supply chains.

My 2019 wish is directed at healthcare’s supply chain leadership. More than encouraging investments aimed at making their supply chains more dynamic, I would like to see the gloves finally taken off and the bullying behavior of major suppliers called out for what it is. To make that happen, healthcare’s supply chain leadership must think more strategically about their supply rationalization strategies across their most important service lines. If for no reason other than to establish balance in important relationships, the effort is essential. Finally, staff must be remotivated to challenge the established order, so programs that reward them for doing it must be instituted, promoted and monitored for results.

More often than not, procurement projects that finally make the docket address problems that staff have been complaining about for a long time. Therefore, having a detailed understanding of the problem is essential. To get there, cross-functional input must be solicited from staff representatives of all affected organizational layers throughout the system design and implementation phases.

One thing that successful change management efforts have in common is that they are typically driven by a combination of front-line workers and back-line executives. When this happens, success if virtually assured. When it doesn’t, well, the odds aren’t great, but sometimes we get lucky (according to statistics, about 46% of the time).

In Part 1 of our series on Prodigo Solutions, we talked about the company’s dedication to the needs of hospital procurement organizations and how it has allowed Prodigo to achieve dominant status in its market. From a change management perspective, Prodigo provides a shining example of how desired results can be achieved when we focus ourselves on doing certain things particularly well. As we know, when we don’t, pushback is a certainty.

Often referred to as “Amazon-like” or the “storefront” application in a P2P suite, Prodigo Solutions’ centerpiece solution is a client-branded, internal marketplace developed exclusively for hospital use. Known as ProdigoMarketplace and complemented by other specialized applications also purpose-built just for hospitals, everything about Prodigo reveals its unmistakable healthcare pedigree. Prodigo’s sole dedication to the needs of hospitals is distinguished and has helped establish the company’s dominance, now boasting half of the nation’s largest and most recognizable health system brands as customers. Prodigo also is one of healthcare’s largest Marketplaces by spend under management — having transformative financial impact on its customers’ supply chain practices and operations.

Spend Matters’ recent coverage of Coupa’s purchase of Aquiire details Coupa’s acquisition rationale and the general wisdom of its decision — but the deal also calls attention to a useful context that evaluators of “Amazon-like” e-procurement systems would be well served to understand. As these systems are tailored for different industries, they should be evaluated for how they differ, not how they're the same. Let's look at three types of marketplaces spawned by the Amazon model.

“Healthcare” and “cybersecurity” don’t seem like they go together, but a security forum this week highlighted how the move to electronic health records and the growing use of connected medical devices — the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) — makes hospitals and patients vulnerable. After attending the forum, it’s clear that hospitals know they’re targets, but they may not understand the scope of the danger. The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) held its security forum in Boston this week, and it attracted a diverse audience. IT, finance and supply chain executives mingled with network security professionals. So hospitals are viewing security in a cross-functional way, and that’s a positive development.

The supplier risk management market includes a highly diverse set of providers, many of which are difficult to compare on an “apples to apples” basis with each other — unlike just about every other procurement technology segment. Within this market — which also can extended deeper into the tiers of a supply base in the form of supply chain risk management — more organizations are seeking to automate the management of risk as much as possible, as accurately as possible. And arguably, LexisNexis Entity Insight (LNEI) is better positioned than many of its peers to have deep, methodologically-driven conversations based on how it adjudicates data and verifies document integrity to drive risk analysis.

This third and final installment of this Spend Matters Vendor Snapshot covering LexisNexis provides an objective SWOT analysis of the provider and offers a competitive segmentation analysis and comparison. It also includes recommended shortlist candidates as alternative vendors to LexisNexis and offers provider-selection guidance. Finally, it gives summary analysis and recommendations for companies considering the vendor. Part 1 provided an in-depth look at LexisNexis as a supply risk provider and its specific solutions, and Part 2 gave a detailed analysis of solution strengths and weaknesses and a review of the product’s user experience.

LexisNexis Entity Insight (LNEI) is a modern, “self-service” supplier management solution that the global data/market intelligence giant built to satisfy increasingly surging market demand for all things supplier risk management. Designed as a cost-effective, off-the-shelf solution, LNEI helps procurement, finance and supply chain organizations manage risk across their own supply networks, regardless of how nested or complex.

This Spend Matters PRO Vendor Snapshot explores LNEI’s strengths and weaknesses, providing facts and expert analysis to help procurement organizations decide whether they should consider the provider. Part 1 of our analysis provided a company and detailed solution overview, as well as a recommend fit list of criteria for firms considering LNEI. The third part of this series will offer a SWOT analysis, user selection guide, competitive alternatives, and additional evaluation and selection considerations.

When patients using medical marijuana go to a hospital, all bets are off. Not only for them, but for a hospital that frankly has no option other than to confiscate their marijuana (or try to do so), assuming they know about it in the first place. Keep in mind, the patient may be legally authorized by the state to use medical marijuana, so the inconsistency here is loaded with potential legal problems. Despite all of this, when the talk of medical marijuana comes up, most all of the hospital officials I have spoken with readily admit that they haven’t even given the subject much thought.

Through a combination of organic growth industry consolidation, three group purchasing organization (GPO) providers have come to dominate the healthcare market. These providers — Vizient, Premier and HealthTrust — control nearly 75% of spend in the healthcare GPO market. Despite this level of consolidation, the three competitors have, in certain cases, targeted different markets and introduced unique offerings. This Spend Matters PRO research brief provides an overview of HealthTrust, including a general introduction, key points analysis, SWOT framework and customer tips for getting the most out of engagement. For background on the GPO market, check out our two earlier briefs, An Introduction to Group Purchasing Organizations (GPOs) and Group Purchasing Organizations: Supplier Perspectives and the Evolving GPO Landscape. For general context, perspective and analysis of the healthcare GPO market in particular, see our recent three-part series: Part 1 (Background, History and Introduction), Part 2 (GPO criticisms and market consolidation/bifurcation) and Part 3 (Key Takeaways, Emerging Paradigm Shifts and Customer Recommendations).