Using the GPOs’ self-reported hospital customer numbers is not an effective measure of size. Premier, for instance, only counts hospitals if they use us as their primary national GPO. Other GPOs apparently count any hospital that purchases off one of their contracts. The fact that the reported number of hospitals in the article is three times the number in the nation validates that we have apples and avocados being compared.
The same holds true for self-reported purchasing volume as a measure of size. There is no consistent method of measuring volume. For instance, some GPOs count all purchasing done by a hospital, regardless of whether the purchase was made on their contracts. Others count a variety of other elements, some of which leads to double counted volume figures.
The article incorrectly implies that comparison of size and volume are possible with self-reported numbers. The reality is that each GPO follows a different approach for calculating these figures, yielding little to no insight into relative sizes of GPOs.
