Ongoing revenue pressure, the drive for innovation and increased market pressures and complexity have magnified the need for bottom-line cost management and profit improvement across the healthcare industry. Improved patient access and care is a key priority, with teams of dedicated resources focused on lowering costs and enhancing services. Strategic initiatives, such as vertical integration and shifts to new models (e.g. telemedicine), present opportunities for greater long-term efficiencies but new approaches to fund these changes must be identified.

Non-clinical spend represents an untapped source of funds, but healthcare systems are often poorly positioned or resourced to extract the value. Optimizing spend in diverse categories like Professional Services, IT and Facilities requires expertise and scale leverage not available to most systems. GPOs effectively offer expertise and scale for clinical spend, but cannot provide the national, regional and local expertise required for similar optimization on the non-clinical side. Broad national GPO contracts with limited suppliers frequently aren’t in-line with the unique regional/local needs of our nation’s healthcare ecosystem. Net, there is money being left on the table that can be better deployed to improve patient experiences.

At the Modern Healthcare Supply Chain and Revenue Cycle Virtual Briefing, WellSpan Health CAO, Keith Noll and Former President of Bon Secours Mercy Health and LifeBridge Health, Brian White, were joined by LogicSource’s David Pennino and Chris Maher to explore how new approaches to non-clinical procurement can stretch dollars further and enable investment in innovation and enhancing patient outcomes.