The supply chain represents the second largest portion of a hospitals operating budget. Many times, healthcare providers overlook the supply chain as a way to improve processes and reduce operating costs. One way these operating costs can be reduced is with technology, especially by automating the purchasing system and better managing transactions. Transaction Management is the key to delivering operational efficiency, so hospital purchasing staff are freed up to concentrate on improving purchasing operations rather than spending excessive amounts of time submitting purchase orders via phone and fax. Transaction Management also ensures the hospital is paying the correct, contracted price for goods and services.

This presentation will take a look at how one health system in particular, MedCath Corporation, utilized transaction management for purchasing to realize significant operational improvements. Learn how your hospital or health system can effectively manage the back office procurement functions through a virtual Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) that eliminates the manual processing of transactions. Automating and standardizing transaction workflow makes it possible to address transactional variances in real time, which results in lower off-contract spend (greater purchasing controls), higher contract compliance, reduced overcharges, greater price parity and less re-work.

Transaction Management can provide real-time notification of missed contract opportunities and follow the hospital or health systems direction on actions that should be taken before or after the purchase. This can range from automatically substituting the converted product or consulting with the requestor or buyer on the missed savings opportunity.

Purchasing data is also continuously reviewed to identify vendors and associated transaction sets that may be automated to improve staff efficiency (i.e., Percentage of P.O. documents issued via 850/855 transaction).

This presentation will take a comprehensive look at MedCath Corporations success in utilizing technology to reduce supply costs and provide guidance on how you can obtain the same results at your facility.