2019 National Healthcare Supply Chain Week | Supporting Clinical Service Lines through Supply Chain Excellence

As change and disruption in the healthcare industry has intensified, many healthcare organizations are faced with ongoing challenges to provide patients access to efficient, effective, and equitable care. In response, leading hospitals and health systems have implemented programs to facilitate communication and idea-sharing among clinical stakeholders to coordinate delivery of the highest quality care.  The Resource Group’s User-Directed Integrated Solution areas have always supported this ‘idea-sharing’ strategy through by employing and end-user-led decision-making process and is advancing that process through enhanced integration with Participants’ Clinical Service Lines. 

Across healthcare, Clinical Service Lines organize similar services around diseases or other care dimensions to better connect with stakeholders and deliver a better-coordinated set of services to patients. At Ascension, The Resource Group’s largest Participant, Clinical Service Line strategies and work must address the added complexity of balancing national strategies with local needs. Luckily, The Resource Group’s structure is ideal to support this complexity with both national and local support already in place. Mike Wray, Vice President, Clinical Integration at The Resource Group explains this structure, “My role is to support Ascension and our Participants’ Clinical Service Line work at the national level. I then also coordinate with our local Value Realization Teams, who are embedded at our Participant sites, to assist in finding the balance between national Clinical Service Line goals and local needs—we call this ‘intentional connectivity’”. 

In addition to intentional connectivity, The Resource Group has also seen success in this area resulting from data-driven tools and processes. For example, The Resource Group works with Ascension Clinical Research Institute (ACRI) to provide healthcare leaders cost-per-case data along with outcome data. By combining this with patient population information, reimbursement levels, and readmission rates, The Resource Group has effectively contributed to the development of clinical strategies that result in better outcomes for patients, lower costs, and more streamlined efforts across Participant sites. “Recently this type of support by The Resource Group, which analyzed cost-per-case, patient outcomes, reimbursement levels, and industry research resulted in a contract signing saving The Resource Group Participant’s over $6 million in annual spend for one common cardiovascular procedure” said Mike, “Our (The Resource Group’s) goal is to continuously address current gaps of information, and in turn, advance the strategic direction of our Participant sites.”

Although The Resource Group’s more integrated involvement in Clinical Service Lines is relatively new, there are a lot of achievements to be proud of along with ambitious goals yet to be achieved. In the near future, The Resource Group will continue to support these Clinical Service Lines to advance clinical quality, continuity of care, financial performance of Participant sites, and most importantly, sustain and improve the health of the individuals and communities we serve.