HealthTrust Increases Purchasing Focus on Purchased Services Expenses

HealthTrust Purchasing Group (HealthTrust), a subsidiary of HCA Healthcare, is committed to strengthening provider performance and clinical excellence through an aligned membership model and the delivery of total spend management advisory solutions.

HealthTrust serves over 1,500 hospitals and health systems, and more than 35,000 other member locations including ambulatory surgery centers, physician practices, long-term care and alternate care sites.

HCA Healthcare, in January 2020, acquired Valify, a Texas health-tech company backed by Frist Cressey Ventures. The web-based technology platform launched in 2014. HealthTrust partnered with the company in 2017 as its technology partner for expense visibility and benchmarking for purchased services. 

In 2018, Valify bought health care vendor comparison platform Lucro Solutions, a startup incubated under Martin Ventures and funded by Heritage Group and Health Insight Capital. 

HealthTrust and Valify, a technology company focused on helping hospitals reduce purchased services expenses, recently launched Valify Solutions Group (VSG,) the first purchased services group purchasing organization (GPO) for healthcare. The new GPO leverages the largest data-driven market intelligence from $460 billion in categorized purchasing volume to generate savings for its members.

Powered by the industry’s leading categorization technology, Valify Solutions Group categorizes non-labor spend and compares it against a comprehensive contract portfolio to identify immediate savings opportunities. Robust algorithms benchmark the categorized data against the industry’s largest database of information from over 1,500 hospitals to help find the next level of savings opportunities for members.

There is no cost to join the purchased services GPO and hospitals can selectively choose from more than 250 contracts, representing more than $8 billion in spend. Membership is non-exclusive, allowing any hospital to participate regardless of its GPO affiliation.

Takeaway: Growing demand in managing purchased services spend offers HealthTrust an opportunity to expand services with HCA Healthcare’s recently acquired Valify