As 2020 came to a close, it was fairly accurate to state that most could not predict how the year would start and end. 2020 was full of twists and turns that fundamentally changed day-to-day life in all aspects. When looking back at 2020, Michael DeLuca, EVP of Operations at Prodigo Solutions, stated, “This is our time to shine as partners in healthcare. The past year, while stressful, complicated, and challenging, did offer valuable lessons to health systems. Pressure builds diamonds, and I know that the innovation coming from suppliers and healthcare providers post 2020 and post pandemic will be the largest digital transformation this industry has seen.” Unlike last year, 2021 was full of healthcare predictions, promises to strengthen supply chains, and vows to make changes that reshape the future. So how did the healthcare industry do in 2021 after that testing year?
2021 may have been a little more predictable than 2020, but this year still had its surprises. The pandemic didn’t recede as much as many may have thought and predicted, and healthcare unfortunately faced continued pressures, short staffing, and COVID-19 case surges. But Prodigo was still optimistic that the industry would rise to the occasion and make changes to benefit everyone in the future, and Prodigo had a front row seat to some of the transformations happening in healthcare. Several existing Prodigo clients went live with new Prodigo supply chain environments or relaunched current environments with new cloud-based ERP systems, and many health systems selected Prodigo to start their own supply chain transformations.
In February, BJC HealthCare went live on Prodigo’s Xchange, a private B2B commerce network for automating EDI and other electronic transactions between business associates. The Xchange network extended the functionality of BJC’s existing Marketplace procurement platform, originally deployed in 2016. The addition of this Xchange environment helped the health system improve vendor adoption of EDI so that it could more quickly automate a greater percentage of its supplier EDI transactions, and it enabled BJC to consolidate its supply chain technology on a single platform while streamlining vendor onboarding and delivering better visibility into transactions with supply vendors.
Allina Health then joined the Marketplace community when it went live with Prodigo’s procurement platform to drive its supply chain transformation. The Marketplace deployment was part of an overall Workday ERP migration for Allina because it helps to extend the functionality of cloud-based, and traditional on-premise ERP offerings. The implementation provided seamless integration of the items, suppliers, and requisitions with Workday, as well as the connection of punch-out vendors and supplier catalog content. Requesters now have a single point of entry into the supply chain workflow and Allina Health is able to significantly improve order accuracy and eliminate operational inefficiencies caused by match exceptions.
Later this year a long-term Prodigo client, OhioHealth, relaunched its Marketplace platform as part of an overall cloud-based ERP conversion with Workday Procurement. OhioHealth has been utilizing Marketplace since 2015 to direct search and purchasing activity to the preferred sources at the right price. Relaunching its Marketplace environment with its new Workday ERP was just the beginning of an exciting new stage in the health system’s supply chain growth.
In addition to some of these client highlights, many health systems selected Prodigo’s platforms and solutions to start their own supply chain transformations, including Surgery Partners, McLeod Health, and Jefferson Health.
Surgery Partners selected Prodigo’s full Solution Suite this spring, including Marketplace, Price Navigator, and Xchange, for process standardization and spend visibility. Jennifer Garza, Senior Analyst, Procurement and Supply Chain at Surgery Partners, and Project Lead, commented, “One of the biggest values we saw in Prodigo was the ability to take our separate processes and establish a standardized approach for data management and procurement across the whole organization.” Prodigo is working with Surgery Partners to integrate multiple ERPs, including Lawson, Oracle, and iOS Envi.
This summer, McLeod Health chose Prodigo’s Marketplace and Data Hub platforms to replace its legacy supply chain technologies. Together, these two platforms will integrate with the McLeod migration to Oracle ERP Cloud and will provide a single source of truth for item and price data, which can then be shared across its entire supply chain. “We were excited to find a solution that supports our cloud-ERP migration and enables us to put our best foot forward,” said Carmen Winfield, Vice President of Procurement Services, McLeod Health. Prodigo will create an intuitive, modern purchasing gateway for McLeod requestors that offers enriched item content and images, bill-only workflow, special request ordering, recall alerts, and substitute item/replacement functionality.
Jefferson Health also recently choose Prodigo’s Marketplace and Xchange platforms knowing that Prodigo’s front-end procurement and easy-to-use interface is something its users will really appreciate, and that the platforms will not only streamline its health system but will also provide an easy-to-use solution for its research community. Together, Prodigo and PeopleSoft will integrate Jefferson Health’s supply chain processes across all departments and deliver a single source of truth for item and price data throughout the hospital ecosystem.
These new and enhanced client partnerships also helped to lay the groundwork for continued collaboration with Workday. In response to the pandemic and the call to reshape and reimagine healthcare supply chain, Prodigo and Workday have aligned their partnership in ways that better help clients achieve their growing goals and visions for transformation. “Prodigo’s ability to connect item and price data across the customer’s technology ecosystem gives our customers the ability to rapidly scale their cloud-ERP modernization efforts, resulting in faster time to value from their technology investments,” said Robert Pavlik, EVP of Business Development at Prodigo. “Through our partnership with Workday, we are able to deliver the results our customers expect.” Not only is Prodigo a Workday Access software partner, but it also achieved Workday Certified Integration status in 2021. Prodigo Marketplace Connect for Workday provides a modern cloud-based architecture that simplifies self-service procurement; creating a seamless, easy-to-use ordering platform that directs search and purchasing activity to the preferred source at the right price, maximizing supply chain visibility while standardizing the procurement workstream for inventory items and commodity supplies, Physician Preference Items (PPI), bill-only items, consignment items, and more.
Other healthcare supply chain leaders also discussed prominent topics in the industry throughout the year through various platforms and industry events.
Temple Health and Prodigo hosted a webinar at the beginning of this year on driving compliance through your spend management platform, a topic that was timely as health systems were recovering from 2020 and looking for new ways to drive compliance and manage spend in 2021. The two organizations examined how compliance effects risk management and financial control in the clinical supply chain, along with managing variation of clinical impacts. Temple Health’s Director of Systems and Measurements, Madhu Pillai, talked about the COVID-19 supply chain crisis at Temple Health and the benefits of Prodigo’s Price Navigator.
Prodigo and IU Health later conducted Part 2 of a discussion on maximizing the value of a cloud-based ERP investment at the Virtual HIUG Interact 2021 Conference and addressed how cloud-based technology can help to solve current supply chain challenges. As a supply chain leader and a first mover in the cloud migration space, Tara Stone Gill, IU Health’s Core Lead SCM, ERP Program reviewed the impacts of a technology partnership and tackled tough questions about the health system’s go-live with Oracle Cloud integrated with Prodigo's Marketplace platform.
This summer, UPMC and Prodigo discussed how integrated health systems have implemented a P2P strategy and automated processes in their supply chain workflows. Kelly Coxon, Senior Director, Procure to Pay at UPMC covered how UPMC tracks and enforces vendor compliance through valuable KPI scorecards and meaningful metrics to the organizations supply chain. The webinar was followed by a Q&A session where industry experts, hospital C-suites, and consultants submitted their questions and perspectives for an engaging and informational session that sparked further discussions and additional insights into P2P processes.
This fall also brought the Prodigo community of clients, partners, and vendors back together in Charleston, SC for Prodigo’s 2021 Annual User Group Meeting. More so than any prior year, attendees came to talk, listen to each other, and learn from their peers. The meeting included representatives from over 20 health systems who discussed pressing issues, emerging trends, and priorities within healthcare supply chains. Prodigo clients shed light on the importance of building responsiveness into their supply chains through improved forecasting, transparency, and vendor risk assessments to mitigate weaknesses in the supply chain that could be exposed in future disruptions.
This year was full of supply chain focused decisions and discussions, and it continued to help healthcare discover a lot about improving health system operations and further strengthening its supply chains. The pandemic has defined a new normal – not just masks and short-term adaptations – but a new normal for the long-term and foreseeable future. Healthcare supply chain digital transformation and “The Cloud” have all been popular topics in healthcare for some time and 2020 highlighted the importance of these movements, but 2021 proved them effective.
Additional Readings
Healthcare Supply Chain Resilience: The Right Response to a New Normal
Data Driven: 2021 Notions of a Healthcare Supply Chain Data Expert