In the face of persistent disruptions across supply chains, health systems across the country are making strides to help strengthen resilience, ensure continual care and build agile, responsive operations.
Below are responses from seven supply chain leaders who were asked: In light of global supply chain disruptions experienced in recent years, what is one key adjustment your health system has made or is working towards to improve supply chain resiliency?
Editor’s note: Responses have been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Derrick Billups. Vice President of Supply Chain and Support Services at UC Health (Cincinnati):
- In response to the global supply chain market and in an effort to improve supply chain resiliency, the UC Health Supply Chain has prioritized contingency planning to strengthen supply reliability. One key adjustment has been expanding communication with our primary suppliers and distributors, which enhances both visibility and resilience across global and domestic supply chains. This proactive approach is allowing us to develop strategies which address potential challenges influenced by changing market conditions. Additionally, we have allocated dedicated resources within our team who are exclusively dedicated to the management of supply backorders and substitutions, ensuring a focused and agile response. By closely monitoring and managing high-priority supplies, we are able to keep critical resources available when needed, ensuring uninterrupted support for our providers and the continuity of care for our patients.
Allison Corry. Chief Supply Chain Officer at Intermountain Health (Salt Lake City):
At Intermountain Health, we recognize the fragility of the supply chain and the underutilization of the inventory assets we have as an enterprise to help us weather disruptions. Individual facilities and decisions about inventory and securing products in a disruption were made based on tribal knowledge, source locations, supplier relationships, and at times, emotions. In a nod to aviation, we’ve stood up a Control Tower team which represents bi-directional transparency and accountability so we use data to respond. This adjustment in our team structure to organize existing resources differently in a Control Tower team enables enterprise response via a centralized approach. This new capability will enable us to look holistically at inventory, reposition inventory throughout the enterprise, and to thoughtfully centralize products to select facilities to minimize change management needs. We are maturing in the space and anticipate the use of AI and technology tools as soon as we are able to glean maximum impact from the investment in supplementary technology once our processes and methodologies are set. We plan to scale the successes we had in the storeroom space into the procedural spaces given the successes we have in waste avoidance of short shelf life items and supply assurance, where individual facilities are not unintentionally competing with each other for the same supplies in a disruption. Our early success was demonstrated most acutely in the recent IV shortage, where through incredible conservation work with our clinical teams and strong Control Tower concepts, we didn’t have to cancel any procedures at Intermountain.
Marisa Farabaugh. Chief Supply Chain Officer at Advent Health (Altamonte Springs, Fla.):
COVID challenged traditional healthcare operations and created new requirements for supply chain reliability and resiliency. This played an integral role in planning for the launch of the AdventHealth Consolidated Service Center. The 375,000-square-foot distribution center utilizes industry-leading technology and talent operating at scale to enable our network to better serve our communities and patients. The modern infrastructure also provides a foundation for AI integration, which will optimize upstream supplier visibility and inventory management.
James Francis. Chair of Supply Chain Management at Mayo Clinic (Rochester, Minn.):
I consider improving supply chain resiliency to require a multi-pronged strategy. If I were to select just one key adjustment, it would be the changes we have made to our distribution network post-COVID. We moved from JIT to dedicated regional warehouse/inventory centers, selected a new primary distributor and required distributors with self-manufactured products to take more ownership in ensuring supply availability. With this came inventory adjustments, safety stock, automation of replenishment and enterprise-wide visibility to inventory/point-of-use locations.
Jake Limbert. System Director of Healthcare Supply Chain at UCSF Health (San Francisco):
Perhaps the most crucial tenet of supply chain resiliency is crisp and clear clinical collaboration. Whether it be insulation from higher prices, outages, or disruptions, the ability to adapt clinically is advantageous to support the continuity of care. This came into hyper focus during the COVID pandemic and, more recently, the IV solution shortage as we were continually vetting viable products as our normal supply chains evaporated. Our clinicians weighed in quickly on product efficacy, new clinical treatments with available products, and ways to conserve stock on hand. These conversations laser-focused our sourcing efforts and fostered trust and transparency with our care teams. Given the uncertainty in the global trade market and rising costs, these relationships will continue to be critical to our supply chain strategy.
Don Parks. Director of Procurement and Strategic Sourcing at UCLA Health (Los Angeles):
We established an offsite Warehouse to supplement our Prime Distribution partner, but not to replace them. We strategically identified supplies that are critical for surgical cases and patient care. We categorized these items into a few buckets:
- Go or no-go items: If we do not have the supply, then surgery cannot be performed. Examples include:
- Breathing circuits
- ET tubes
- IV blood tuning
- IV solutions and sets: Mainly a result of two significant supply chain shortages with Baxter over the past 7-8 years due to natural disasters.
- Personal protective equipment
- Reprocessed items: Reuse increases available inventory, as we are not reliant on the global supply chain.
Jae Yu. Senior Director of Supply Chain Operations at Tenet Healthcare (Dallas):
It’s a good question. For us, we’ve invested heavily in aligning critical roles—internally and also across our supplier network—with individuals who bring the right expertise, skill-set, and decision-making authority. By streamlining governance and eliminating the administrative inefficiencies (“bureaucracy”) that often hinder healthcare operations, we’ve enhanced responsiveness, improved cross-functional coordination during disruption, and reduced our overall risk. It’s not the most exciting answer—e.g., implementing an AI control tower to monitor global crisis networks or leveraging some other proposed “cutting edge” solution—but it’s practical, cost-effective, and proven. It works for us.