Health systems are facing increasing pressure to manage costs, ensure supply availability, optimize contracts and improve operational effectiveness. For many organizations, particularly those without the scale or internal expertise, capturing meaningful savings and supporting overall financial health while maintaining physician alignment can feel out of reach.
Through the Pointcore Supply Chain Collaborative, member organizations gain access to strategic contracting support, aggregated spend and clinically integrated sourcing, enabling them to achieve measurable results across multiple categories.
The following three examples highlight how Pointcore can deliver value to members across key supply chain categories.
Driving Savings
Through Aggregated Contracting
CHALLENGE
When the Collaborative first explored aggregated contracting, spinal hardware presented a complex test case: seven member facilities performed spine surgery with highly variable surgeon preferences, making it difficult to standardize while still leveraging scale for competitive pricing. Pointcore needed to create a spinal hardware portfolio that could address the needs of all members.
SOLUTION
Pointcore combined $13.5 million in spinal hardware volume to take to market and developed a pricing model that directly engaged surgeons. By capping prices across four key suppliers and aligning nearly 90% of market share commitments among them, the Collaborative ensured both surgical buy-in and purchasing strength. Deep data modeling compared current pricing to national benchmarks to target top-quartile costs, and executive leadership and surgeons were engaged multiple times to secure alignment.
RESULTS
- Approximately $2.74 million was achieved in net savings, which was a 20.2% reduction.
- The market share remained around 93% with the top four suppliers after two years.
- Pointcore was positioned as the centralized resource for new product requests with surgical leader guidance.
Optimizing Physician Preference Items (PPI)
CHALLENGE
Hip and knee arthroplasty had historically achieved top-quartile pricing but needed a refreshed contracting strategy that could extend competitive terms across all members without sacrificing surgeon support.
SOLUTION
Pointcore merged more than $31 million in hip and knee volume and created a capitated component pricing model with surgeon engagement, capping the price for similar components across suppliers. The model structure secured a 90% commitment to the top five suppliers. This was achieved by collaborating with the administrative teams and orthopedic surgeons of Collaborative members to ensure alignment throughout the negotiation. Late-stage engagement with suppliers also helped prevent non-compliance.
RESULTS
- $3.9 million in net savings was achieved, which was a 12.5% cost reduction.
- All five contracted suppliers delivered similar top-quartile pricing
- Smaller Collaborative members saw greater relative benefit due to their starting price points, while larger members supported the agreement for overall membership value.
Expanding Value Across Purchased Services and Capital
CHALLENGE
Pointcore sought to drive savings by leveraging custom contracting on a regional scale. In this effort, the pharmacy volumes from OSF HealthCare and Health Enterprises Cooperative (HEC) were combined to improve negotiating strength.
SOLUTION
Pointcore consolidated $277 million in annual distribution volume and opened contracting discussions with major distributors, including Cardinal, McKesson and Amerisource Bergen (now Cencora). The Collaborative engaged pharmacy leaders throughout the process to ensure stakeholder participation. In the final stages of vendor selection, some hospitals expressed concerns about EMR alignment, but Pointcore helped administrative leaders understand and champion the significant financial benefits of the contract so needed resources could be committed.
RESULTS
- $22 million in net savings was achieved – a 7.9% cost reduction.
- Year one saw a growth incentive rebate of $1.4 million.
- Over three years, membership rose four tiers and improved the cost-minus structure through acquisitions, recruitment and sourcing standardization, with Pointcore supporting members during service disruptions.
Delivering Results Where It Matters Most
Across niche categories like spinal hardware, common PPI categories such as hip and knee arthroplasty, and broader regional contracting initiatives, these examples highlight a consistent challenge facing healthcare organizations: reducing costs without compromising clinical acceptance.
Pointcore’s approach to this challenge includes:
- Aggregating meaningful spend to improve market leverage
- Engaging clinical stakeholders to secure alignment and acceptance
- Delivering measurable savings without sacrificing clinician support
The result is not only measurable cost reduction, but stronger supplier agreement, improved contract performance and greater confidence that supply chain decisions will be supported at the clinical level.
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of the Pointcore Supply Chain Collaborative?
Connect with us to explore how we can bring together strategic sourcing, physician alignment and supplier selection to drive real supply chain value.
