Analytics and the Optimization of Blood Products Utilization: Premier Healthcare Alliance Shows the Way

Millions in savings in the Carolinas

At the 33-hospital Carolinas HealthCare System, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, Jim Olsen, the system’s vice president of materials resource management, has been working with many of his colleagues to work on cost control strategies. “Carolinas is one of the leading healthcare systems in the Southeast, and one of the largest public, not-for-profit systems in the nation,” Olsen explained at the briefing. “And our goal in this area has been to continue to identify cost savings, so we can continue to help patients regardless of their ability to pay. We looked at physician preferences and found gaps. We could get at cost, but not outcomes. But we’ve found over the last two years that, in working with Premier’s QualityAdvisor™ program”—which helps organizations benchmark their outcomes against those of peer patient care organizations—we could get system-level reports, and could get them quickly, and could [compare our performance against] that whole database of hospitals, to identify cost-effectiveness variations across a number of hospitals larger than our system, and to do comparative effectiveness to drive improved outcomes at lower cost.”

Jim Olsen

Olsen noted that Carolinas HealthCare System’s work on optimizing the utilization of blood products has been part of a far broader effort to optimize processes across its surgical service lines. In that context, he noted, colleagues from 16 Carolinas hospitals have worked together to identify $58 million in potential savings across three specific diagnosis-related groups (DRGs): joint replacement, spinal implant, and cardiac stent procedures. Inevitably, he said, when it comes to any area that he and his colleagues looked at in terms of resources within the surgery area, whether blood product utilization or surgical devices, the key to success so far with regard to utilization optimization has been leveraging data analytics to engage with surgeons and other physicians in process improvement efforts.

Advice for CIOs and CMIOs

Presenters at the Premier press briefing were glad to share their perspectives on the implications for CIOs, CMIOs, and other healthcare IT leaders that might be apparent based on their organizations’ experiences. “Obviously, one piece of this,” said Carolinas HealthCare’s Olsen, “is that all of this information, this clinical information, is very important, and the accuracy of that information is paramount. The other important thing is to be able to understand how some of these analyses can be done, because what we find when we’re sitting down with the physicians and surgeons is that they’re primarily concerned with the process that led to the data analysis, and the accuracy of that analysis; and if there is a problem with the accuracy or process, you’re just dead in the water. So,” he said,  having the accuracy be perfect, and making sure you have a good, consistent process, is key.”

Creating highly collaborative processes is also crucial, said Bon Secours’ Priest. “Engage in regular and frequent contact with your clinicians and executive leaders, so that the three languages you speak can blend into one language,” Priest urged CIOs and CMIOs. “My second piece of advice,” he added, “would be to achieve acceptance of the currently available technology, as you drive change using the currently technology.”

Richard Bankowitz, M.D.

And Richard Bankowitz, M.D., enterprise-wide chief medical officer at Premier healthcare alliance, added that “Information needs to be relevant, accurate, and placed in context. Marlon [Priest] spoke about the relevance of the data; if I were a CIO or CMIO, I’d make sure to collaborate with the clinicians to assure accuracy as well as relevant outcomes—things like MI [myocardial infarction], fluid overload, heart failure—there will be a list of things clinicians will want to see. It goes without saying about the accuracy of the data,” Bankowitz said. “And in terms of context, you really need to understand how your practice pattern compares with peer organizations, not only in terms of utilization, but also in terms of relevant outcomes.”