Seven North Carolina hospitals who formed the Southern Atlantic Health Care Alliance purchasing coalition in 2007 have reportedly saved $2.8 million in supply costs over the past two years.
Alliance officials say the hospitals aggregate their purchasing volume – thereby achieving greater savings than they could realize individually – yet retain their ability to make independent decisions about product purchases.
Susan Aquino-Smith, contract administrator for The Moses Cone Health System in Greensboro, N.C., and chairman of SAHA’s joint implementation team, said the hospitals adopted aggregate tactics to help them do more with reduced resources.
"The Moses Cone Health System values the SAHA membership because we've realized more than $500,000 in savings since joining the network," said Aquino-Smith. "We are working on several initiatives and believe that these savings will grow as SAHA continues to mature."
In addition to Moses Cone, the six other SAHA member hospitals are Betsy Johnson Regional Hospital in Dunn, Davidson Health Care in Lexington, the High Point Regional Health System in High Point, the Nash Health Care System in Rocky Mount, Sampson Regional Medical Center in Clinton and WakeMed Health and Hospitals in Raleigh.
Scott Downing, executive vice president of supply chain management at VHA, a healthcare group purchasing organization based in Irving, Texas, said current economic conditions are forcing hospitals to develop new strategies to stretch their budgets without impinging on patient care.
“Purchasing coalitions create opportunities for savings on clinical commodities that hospitals use every day as well as more specialized products, resulting in significant savings while fostering peer-to-peer interaction and knowledge sharing," he said.
In one savings strategy, SAHA members created a prototype with member-approved features for some existing patient footwear. Because members agreed to aggregate their purchasing volumes and the supplier agreed to make the changes and lower the cost, SAHA officials say this initiative will reduce costs and decrease the number of inventory stock keeping units, or SKUs, for hospitals that discontinue their use of hard-soled slippers.