Publication by Healthcare Purchasing News
Ask progressive doctors, surgeons and nurses to list their top cost drivers and they’ll likely unspool a litany of clinical, fiscal and operational sins familiar to just about anyone on the clinical and business sides of healthcare.
Of course, each clinical specialty may have its own nuances. But cost drivers making the scroll can include overuse of antibiotics, prescription drug consumption, unnecessary testing and treatments in laboratory and diagnostic imaging, population growth and aging, price inflation, technology advancements and changes, as well as over-utilization of services, such as the emergency room as primary care doctor. They also might cite increased demands for administrative participation, such as populating patients’ electronic health records and submitting payer paperwork, as well as searching for needed supplies that may be misplaced or missing for whatever reason. Naturally, they blame Supply Chain, and maybe rightly so.
As supply chain operations expands to assume larger “support services or system services” roles and embarks on the road to becoming what some studies predict as a healthcare organization’s largest expense category, particularly with the inclusion of outsourced labor and purchased services in the mix, what would Supply Chain professionals tag as their top cost drivers?
Healthcare Purchasing News reached out to more than 20 executives from providers, suppliers and service companies to share their insights. Here’s what they revealed in random and wide-ranging order.
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