This article was written by Richard Peters, senior director of surgery services at Provista, LLC, a leading supply chain improvement company.
Increased competition, reduced reimbursements and a slowly rebounding economy make for a demanding business climate for healthcare providers. Adapting to this means surgery centers must look at their operations with an unflinching eye towards reducing costs while maintaining quality of care. To succeed in the new world of healthcare, providers must begin to aggressively pursue successful physician preference management activities to align costs with care options.
As with research, benchmarking is a necessary first step is to understand where you are so that you can set goals to get where you want to be. While the term "benchmarking" is not new, it is gaining in popularity. At the heart of benchmarking is the core idea of comparison. Benchmarking sets the standards for reducing physician preference management costs by helping to identify how the organization is currently operating and to set goals.
Leaders of acute and non-acute care organizations have found benchmarking to be a valuable tool for achieving cost savings by improving productivity and patient outcomes. In addition, benchmarking has provided the means to increase physician involvement in key decisions about high-dollar supplies, such as implantables, by painting a clear picture of "what is" and "what could be" with hard data.
Healthcare organizations are rich with data, and while internal benchmarking identifies best practices within the organization, external data can help administrators put their operations in context of the larger industry. Gathering the appropriate information can provide valuable insight for benchmarking initiatives and can also be an area your GPO could assist with.
Benchmarking often involves comparing the organization's own data to external data sources to determine performance improvement opportunities, metrics such as utilization, price, physician practice and more which organizations can use to improve.
Many attempts to work with physicians on supply chain issues fail because they are not supported by a solid infrastructure. Getting physicians involved early and often in discussions about physician preference items creates buy-in and increases interest and participation. There are many ways to establish a credible infrastructure. Frequently, organizations integrate efforts into an existing committee structure. An ideal place for these discussions to begin are within established clinical practice committees or other bodies created within the governance structure of the medical staff and health care organization. Introducing a supply chain component to the agenda backed by hard data provides physicians with the evidence they need to make informed decisions about supplies.
Working with a physician champion who can spearhead a physician preference initiative lends credibility and provides an opportunity for productive peer-to-peer discussions about the efficacy of changing supplies. Your GPO can serve as another source of information, as purchasing groups prepare reports demonstrating objective industry-wide data about the cost and quality of similar products to help with the decision-making process. Finally, forming value analysis teams can prove helpful in getting physicians on-board as the committee works towards product selections. These teams focus on the cost, quality and effectiveness of individual products in a specific category from a clinical perspective. They analyze and compare data across the category and produce supply and equipment recommendations based on their findings.
Though in the past, physicians have not had to consider costs as part of their treatment decision, alignment efforts — though not easy — can be one of the most direct mechanisms for improving an organization's bottom line. Anecdotal evidence points towards physicians being more willing to take an active role in solutions, which is proving positive for all parties. With quality and patient safety taking center stage, the need to establish a means to measure an organization's commitment to excellence and gauge results must take a leading role.
Richard Peters is senior director of surgery services at Provista, LLC, a leading supply chain improvement company.
Related Articles on Surgery Center Supply Chain:
Toshiba Receives FDA Clearance for Vantage Titan 1.5T MRI
Siemens to Acquire Integrated Ultrasound Imaging Systems Manufacturer
Covalon Receives FDA Clearance for Antimicrobial Silicone Wound Dressing
Increased competition, reduced reimbursements and a slowly rebounding economy make for a demanding business climate for healthcare providers. Adapting to this means surgery centers must look at their operations with an unflinching eye towards reducing costs while maintaining quality of care. To succeed in the new world of healthcare, providers must begin to aggressively pursue successful physician preference management activities to align costs with care options.
As with research, benchmarking is a necessary first step is to understand where you are so that you can set goals to get where you want to be. While the term "benchmarking" is not new, it is gaining in popularity. At the heart of benchmarking is the core idea of comparison. Benchmarking sets the standards for reducing physician preference management costs by helping to identify how the organization is currently operating and to set goals.
Leaders of acute and non-acute care organizations have found benchmarking to be a valuable tool for achieving cost savings by improving productivity and patient outcomes. In addition, benchmarking has provided the means to increase physician involvement in key decisions about high-dollar supplies, such as implantables, by painting a clear picture of "what is" and "what could be" with hard data.
Healthcare organizations are rich with data, and while internal benchmarking identifies best practices within the organization, external data can help administrators put their operations in context of the larger industry. Gathering the appropriate information can provide valuable insight for benchmarking initiatives and can also be an area your GPO could assist with.
Benchmarking often involves comparing the organization's own data to external data sources to determine performance improvement opportunities, metrics such as utilization, price, physician practice and more which organizations can use to improve.
Many attempts to work with physicians on supply chain issues fail because they are not supported by a solid infrastructure. Getting physicians involved early and often in discussions about physician preference items creates buy-in and increases interest and participation. There are many ways to establish a credible infrastructure. Frequently, organizations integrate efforts into an existing committee structure. An ideal place for these discussions to begin are within established clinical practice committees or other bodies created within the governance structure of the medical staff and health care organization. Introducing a supply chain component to the agenda backed by hard data provides physicians with the evidence they need to make informed decisions about supplies.
Working with a physician champion who can spearhead a physician preference initiative lends credibility and provides an opportunity for productive peer-to-peer discussions about the efficacy of changing supplies. Your GPO can serve as another source of information, as purchasing groups prepare reports demonstrating objective industry-wide data about the cost and quality of similar products to help with the decision-making process. Finally, forming value analysis teams can prove helpful in getting physicians on-board as the committee works towards product selections. These teams focus on the cost, quality and effectiveness of individual products in a specific category from a clinical perspective. They analyze and compare data across the category and produce supply and equipment recommendations based on their findings.
Though in the past, physicians have not had to consider costs as part of their treatment decision, alignment efforts — though not easy — can be one of the most direct mechanisms for improving an organization's bottom line. Anecdotal evidence points towards physicians being more willing to take an active role in solutions, which is proving positive for all parties. With quality and patient safety taking center stage, the need to establish a means to measure an organization's commitment to excellence and gauge results must take a leading role.
Richard Peters is senior director of surgery services at Provista, LLC, a leading supply chain improvement company.
Related Articles on Surgery Center Supply Chain:
Toshiba Receives FDA Clearance for Vantage Titan 1.5T MRI
Siemens to Acquire Integrated Ultrasound Imaging Systems Manufacturer
Covalon Receives FDA Clearance for Antimicrobial Silicone Wound Dressing