15 Recommendations for Building Healthcare Supply Chain of the Future

Thought Leaders project taps providers, distributors, and manufacturers to identify strategies that address changing landscape

ARLINGTON, Va., March 13, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The HIDA Educational Foundation today released 15 key recommendations to help supply chain leaders anticipate and respond to trends including declining reimbursements, market consolidation, and healthcare reform. Top recommendations included improving contracting processes to reduce complexity and unproductive costs, linking products to outcomes, and championing data standards.

The recommendations resulted from a year-long collaboration between the HIDA Educational Foundation, an affiliate of the Health Industry Distributors Association (HIDA), and McKinsey & Company.

The top recommendation, "fix the contracting process," reflects growing awareness of the unnecessary costs that inefficient and unproductive contracting practices add to all levels of the supply chain.

HIDA launched the Thought Leaders initiative to provide insights to its members on the unprecedented changes occurring in healthcare markets.  HIDA enlisted McKinsey & Company to conduct in-depth interviews with dozens of healthcare provider executives across healthcare settings.  HIDA's own thought leaders then met with the McKinsey team to evaluate the provider input and develop recommendations for the industry as a whole.

HIDA's Thought Leader participants prioritized the 15 recommendations as follows:

  1. Fix the contracting process
  2. Link products and outcomes
  3. Implement and champion data standards
  4. Partner in standardization/streamlining efforts
  5. Enable the home setting
  6. Address end-to-end supply chain cost
  7. Expand the scope of products in distribution
  8. Invest in new capabilities to enhance service across care settings
  9. Leverage data to create actionable insights
  10. Support new front-line care models
  11. Leverage non-acute data
  12. Evolve the go-to-market strategy
  13. Aggressively strip away supply chain costs
  14. Provide greater transparency to product and service costs
  15. Prepare to shoulder some risk burden

The recommendations are laid out in the free white paper "Healthcare Supply Chain 2015: Strategic Insights for the Distribution Channel," available at www.hida.org.

About HIDA
The Health Industry Distributors Association (HIDA) is the premier trade association representing medical products distribution. HIDA members primarily serve the nation's hospital, long term care, and physician/alternate care markets. For more information, visit www.HIDA.org or www.streamlininghealthcare.org.

About McKinsey & Company
McKinsey & Company is a global management consulting firm dedicated to helping the world's leading organizations address their strategic challenges.

SOURCE Health Industry Distributors Association (HIDA)

RELATED LINKS
http://www.hida.org/
http://www.streamlininghealthcare.org/