Champlain Health Supply Services Selects GHX Connectivity, Software Solutions to Enhance Supply Chain Services for 11 Hospitals

TORONTO, March 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Champlain Health Supply Services (CHSS), a newly formed shared service organization that provides integrated supply chain services to 11 hospitals in the greater Ottawa area, has chosen a combination of GHX connectivity and software solutions to increase efficiencies and reduce costs for its participating hospitals. The GHX solutions selected by CHSS will connect the hospitals with 90 percent of the trading partners from which they purchase medical-surgical supplies and with HealthPRO, their group purchasing organization (GPO), allowing them to conduct business electronically through a consolidated integration platform. The GHX solutions also include data management and price management capabilities.

Because all of the hospitals have different information technology systems, one of CHSS' objectives was to enable its members to work together collectively as a region while still using their existing technology infrastructure. The GHX exchange will provide an existing technology platform to allow them to do that much more quickly than would be possible with a multi-year ERP implementation. In Canada, approximately 700 healthcare provider locations are connected to the exchange, along with 70 supplier divisions.

Participating hospitals also will use the GHX NuVia(SM) data management software to cleanse, enhance and consolidate data so the hospitals can work in a more regional and integrated manner; the GHX Contract Center Xpert price management tool, which hosts and validates HealthPRO and supplier contract pricing updates; and MetaTrade, a service that will enable them to send, receive and view electronic transactions from suppliers that aren't yet connected to GHX or do not have electronic data interchange (EDI) capabilities.

CHSS sites that will employ the GHX solution are The Ottawa Hospital, Queensway Carleton Hospital, Bruyere Continuing Care, Montfort Hospital, Pembroke Regional Hospital, Hawkesbury General Hospital, Renfrew Regional Hospital and Cornwall Community Hospital. Three additional sites, Arnprior & District Hospital, Carleton Place & District Memorial Hospital and Kemptville District Hospital, will be serviced through Queensway Carleton Hospital.

John Martin, region lead for Integrated Supply Services for CHSS, said the organization chose GHX because it offered the best way to lower supply chain costs by allowing them to standardize products, utilize contracts and maximize prime vendor relationships without requiring a change to CHSS' existing IT infrastructure. "GHX already provided the technology platform we needed," he said, "and they also offered data and price management solutions that will enable us to optimize our supply chain to drive real value."

Martin will lead a session on data management across disparate systems at the annual GHX Supply Chain Summit to be held March 29-31, 2010, in Orlando, Florida. His presentation will cover how creation of a single data repository that can be shared by all 11 hospitals will help standardize business processes and improve efficiencies and data accuracy across the region.

Nils Clausen, general manager, GHX Canada, said the approach CHSS is taking toward a total supply chain solution through GHX is the first of its kind in Canadian healthcare and will provide an excellent example of a leading-practice model for other shared service organizations in the country. "The CHSS project is significant because it addresses not only technology, but also business processes and resources that are integral components in any supply chain transformational change," he said.

About GHX

As the business hub for healthcare, Global Healthcare Exchange, LLC (GHX) enables healthcare providers and suppliers in North America and Europe to reduce costs and improve margins by automating processes, reducing operating expenses and increasing knowledge-based decision making. Products and services include trading partner connectivity, order and contract management and validation, data synchronization, sales force automation and business intelligence. Equity owners of GHX are Abbott Exchange, Inc.; AmerisourceBergen Corp.; Baxter Healthcare Corp.; B. Braun Medical Inc.; BD; Boston Scientific Corp.; Cardinal Health, Inc.; Covidien; C.R. Bard, Inc.; Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.; GE Healthcare; HCA; Johnson & Johnson Health Care Systems Inc.; McKesson Corp.; Medtronic USA, Inc.; Owens & Minor; Premier, Inc.; Siemens; University HealthSystem Consortium; and VHA Inc.  For more information, visit www.ghx.com.

About Champlain Health Supply Services (CHSS)

Hospitals in the Champlain LHIN have a history of collaboration, working together to improve the delivery of patient care and services to the clients in the region. To this end, Champlain Health Supply Services (CHSS) was incorporated in the Spring of 2008. The long term vision of CHSS is to implement a shared service organization to integrate sourcing, procurement and logistics for Hospitals and ultimately other health care providers in the Champlain region. The integrated Supply Chain system will improve client performance and generate savings for use in direct patient care.

The Sourcing integration initiative is underway with the eleven Hospital participants in the Champlain Health Supply Services organization. A parallel activity for Champlain regional logistics is completing its business case approval process and a Request for Proposal to complete an Implementation Analysis for regional Procurement has been released.

SOURCE GHX