Category: Health

Supply chains critical to well-being of healthcare systems

 In the health-care field where precision is literally a matter of life and death, it may seem strange, even a little frightening, that a crucial supportive function like inventory and purchasing often is a hit-or-miss process. But unlike other industries where supply chains receive detailed attention, in the health-care system, no one’s yet figured out how to cross the t’s and dot the i’s. While there are some high performing systems, others fall short of the supply-chain efficiencies that have been adopted in other industries. Several researchers at the W. P. Carey School of Business are attempting to find a way to benchmark how hospital supply chains work. A best-practices model, the researchers hope, will result in a new benchmarking approach that could boost health-care reform significantly.

True consumerism: The cure for an ailing health care system?

In a few years, one out of every five dollars spent in this country will be consumed by the health care system, according to Michael McCallister, president and CEO of Humana, Inc. By the year 2022, if trends continue, it will cost $55,000 to insure the average American family, he warned. “As we move toward a global market, we can’t expect the economy to soak this up indefinitely without other implications,” McCallister said in a speech at the W. P. Carey School’s “Transforming American Healthcare: Pathways to Change” symposium. Solutions, he said, include adoption of technology by the health care industry and a paradigm shift toward true consumerism.

IT is prescription for ailing U.S. health care system

This is the decade when the world will undergo profound disruptions in health care — “sweeping change that threatens established models and businesses,” according to Caroline Kovac, general manager of IBM’s health care and life sciences division. Part of that change will be driven by lengthening life expectancy, which has increased 30 years over the last century, Kovac says. As the baby boomers reach their golden years, the system will be burdened by chronic conditions like heart disease, arthritis, diabetes. Their care will force medical costs ever skyward. Kovac asserts that our health-care system’s salvation lies in using IT to move toward personalized, molecular medicine with an emphasis toward proactive, rather than reactive, approaches to patient care.

Change from the inside out: Keystones are risk, competence and persistence

Many health-care professionals believe a true transformation of the system requires changes from within. Rather than piecemeal fixes around the edges or in pockets, the very fabric that makes up the system — the infrastructure — has to change in order for the system to get ahead of the technological and medical advances. One example of this kind of fundamental change began in the mid-1950s, when a Duke University medical school professor attempted to alleviate the shortage of physicians by creating a new model of teaching medical students: The physician assistant came to be a critical member of the health-care community. Another important change will occur when leaders fully collaborate with a team, recognize that everyone brings something different to the table, and acknowledge that they don’t always have all the information. The keystones of transformation, say health-care innovation experts, are risk, competence and persistence.

Supply chain makeover rejuvenates medical center

Chief financial officers searching for ways to cut costs while jump-starting service might want to spend an afternoon with Allen Caudle, vice president of supply chain at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle, Washington. Caudle’s supply-chain strategies saved Swedish more than $30 million in 2005. As his peers increasingly rely on group purchasing organizations (GPOs) to get better prices from vendors, Caudle and his team manage spending the old-fashioned way, through strict internal buying policies, central purchasing, self-contracting and tight vendor control. A devotee of Toyota’s “lean management” approach, Caudle eyes everything from technicians’ work habits to the time it takes housekeeping to clean empty rooms. His slogan is: “Use our minds before we spend our bucks.”

Government has crucial role in health care reform, says Bradley

“The best health care in the world is here in America. But the reality is … we don’t have the best health-care system in the world,” said Bill Bradley, former Democratic senator from New Jersey. The current system is unsustainable, he said, echoing what many health-care professionals and those outside the system have been saying for years. It can be remedied if people call on their government to develop common goals, guiding principles, and measurable successes. Among the principles Bradley suggested: providing all individuals with a choice of health-care plans at differing costs; copays of some sort for all services; individual responsibility for behaviors such as smoking and obesity that cause health problems, and a cooperative effort of government and private companies to end to the cost-shifting game.