Alomere Health, https://alomerehealth.org, a 99 bed hospital located in Alexandra Minnesota, is working with the Vanderbilt Health Purchasing Collaborative https://vanderbiltpurchasingcollaborative.com, (VHPC) a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) https://ww2.mc.vanderbilt.edu. The hospital in the first three years of participating in VHPC has saved more than $1 million.
VUMC with more than 1,000 beds gets better pricing on everything from spinal implants to pharmaceuticals which has resulted in saving about $4 to $5 million annually as a result of participating in the VHPC. Launched in 2014, the collaborative now includes 50 hospitals, clinics, and ambulatory surgery centers in 43 states.
The VHPC is able to increase volume and access to local markets and obtain the best-tier pricing to reduce costs for items purchased through hospital owned contracts, such as exist in Group Purchasing Organizations (GPO).
Alomere Health is also a member of the Rural Health Alliance (RHA) https://www.myrha.com, a group of hospitals, clinics, and surgery centers in 16 states. RHA’s goal is to drive additional savings for members that could not be achieved by the Alliance alone. In the past three years through the affiliation with RHA, members have achieved $2.5 million in total signed contractual savings.
“Our relationship with RHA and Vanderbilt has helped Alomere Health reduce costs and remain financially strong, while many independent hospitals struggle and continue to align with larger health systems”, said Alomere Health’s CEO Carl Vaagenes.