For the second year in a row, Cleveland Clinic took the top spot in the annual Gartner Healthcare Supply Chain Top 25 ranking, which includes an environmental, social and governance (ESG) measure for the first time. Banner Health, Corewell Health (formerly Spectrum Health/BHSH), Advocate Aurora Health and Ochsner Health round out the top five on the list.
Four healthcare providers make their debut in the 2022 ranking: Stanford Health Care, Allina Health, CommonSpirit Health and Sutter Health. Providence returned to the ranking for the first time since 2018.
Gartner describes the Healthcare Supply Chain Top 25 ranking as being derived from two main analyses: quantitative measures and opinion components. Quantitative measures provide a view into how companies have performed in the past and establish proxy connections between financial health, quality of patient care, ESG and supply chain excellence. The opinion components offer a qualitative assessment of value chain leadership and demonstrated supply chain performance. The qualitative and quantitative components are combined into a total composite score.
In a release, Eric O’Daffer, vice president analyst with the Gartner Supply Chain practice, commented on trends Gartner is seeing. “While in years past we have seen an emphasis on cost and efficiency related to capabilities, this year is different. Costs are higher and margins are decreasing. The expectation is for supply chains to drive cost savings, while simultaneously adding services and increasing resiliency.”
“Addressing financial pressures is the number one issue facing health supply chain leaders,” added O’Daffer. “This is a challenge we don’t expect to lessen soon. To address the situation, health systems should focus on building traditional financial improvement initiatives, collaboration with suppliers for cost savings and furthering cooperation with clinicians on standardization initiatives through integrated value analysis programs.”
O’Daffer said Cleveland Clinic’s leadership in supply chain includes its work focused on supplier diversity, clinical integration, a resiliency program and workforce optimization.
The Healthcare Supply Chain Top 25 Masters recognizes sustained supply chain leadership. This recognition is awarded only to supply chains that have achieved a top-five score at least seven times in the past 10 years. “Mayo Clinic and Intermountain Healthcare maintained their leadership positions as Masters for the fifth year in a row,” said O’Daffer. “This year, they showcased innovative approaches in areas such as cost optimization, ESG and a commitment to supply chain resiliency.”
This year, Gartner has introduced an ESG measure to the quantitative metric. Twenty-eight percent of health systems in the Top 25 received a perfect score in the ESG metric, and 60 percent received some credit. Initiatives health systems in the ranking are undertaking include increasing supply spend from diverse vendors and adding goals for their sourcing teams to measure this spend.
