UISS had a very busy quarter. We hosted our first Supply Chain Symposium at the Turning Stone Resort Casino on September 11, 2024. The successful event sponsored by Nexera featured networking opportunities and insightful sessions for healthcare supply chain professionals. Awards were given to US Foods and SpendMend for supplier recognition, and individual accolades for members from River Hospital and Samaritan Medical Center were also awarded.
Keynote speaker Dr. Jimmy Chung emphasized the need for healthcare organizations to shift their sourcing strategies to enhance value-based care, highlighting the significant role of social determinants of health. Jacob Wheeler’s presentation on cybersecurity discussed the risks posed to supply chains and provided strategies for mitigation.
Additionally, UISS sponsored members to attend Premier’s Annual Breakthroughs Conference from July 23-25, 2024, focusing on the theme “UNITED.” The event featured sessions on technology, artificial intelligence, and healthcare transformation. UISS also hosted a happy hour for networking among members.
2024 Supply Chain Symposium
On behalf of IHA & UISS, we’d like to extend a warm thank you to all who were able to attend and take part in our first ever Supply Chain Symposium this week at The Turning Stone Resort Casino. The Supply Chain Symposium was held on September 11, 2024 at the Turning Stone Resort Casino. It was a day full of valuable networking opportunities with fellow healthcare Supply Chain Professionals, and engaging sessions designed to enhance the participants industry knowledge.
A special thank you to our event sponsor, Nexera!
We’d also like to extend a special congratulations to all of our award winners this year!
We kicked off our Supply Chain Symposium with an award ceremony dedicated to supply chain and supplier recognition.
Our 2024 Supplier Recognition Awards went to:
- US Foods, Albany Division, Nicholas Palumbo: Nicholas Palumbo, Vice President, National Sales, received the award for demonstrating continuous improvement in delivering industry-leading value to UISS members while consistently seeking new and innovative ways to improve services, support and value.
- SpendMend: For providing innovative and valuable products and services that help to lower supply chain costs and improve operating efficiencies for UISS members.
Our 2024 Supply Chain, Critical Access Hospital Recognition Award went to:
- River Hospital, Robert LeBlanc: Robert LeBlanc, Director of Supply Chain, received the award in recognition of your outstanding performance in improving supply chain procurement & operations.
Our 2024 Supply Chain Recognition Awards went to:
- Samaritan Medical Center, Supply Chain Team, Laura Williams: Laura Williams, Director, Supply Chain, received the award in recognition of outstanding total cost management & supply chain transformation.
- Samaritan Medical Center, Supply Chain Team, Maxine Briggs: Maxine Briggs, Vice President of Finance and CFO, received the award in recognition of outstanding total cost management & supply chain transformation.
Our Keynote speaker, Dr. Jimmy Chung, MD, MBA, FAS FABQAURP, CPE, CMRP, Chief Medical Officer with Advantus Health Partners, delivered an impressive presentation, “Think Outside the Box; It’s Time for Supply Chain to Save the Day”, provided insights into the market conditions currently driving the need for a shift in sourcing. 
Dr. Chung explained that organizations pride themselves on providing excellent care, but there’s always room for improvement. Even before the provider and patient meet. In previous years, executives, clinicians and Supply Chain focused on “physician preferences”. Today, the path to achieving value is through a reduction in costs, while maintaining a high level of quality and the best possible patient outcomes. Dr. Chung stressed the importance of Health Equality to the healthcare system, explaining that social and economic factors represent over 50% of health drivers, while genes and biology make up only 5%. The path towards value-based health resource optimization means reducing unnecessary variations, which will in turn reduce waste and improve safety. Health systems should leverage analytics through AI-generative technologies to maximize the benefits of standardization, increasing physician engagement through meaningful data that will result in greater health equity and overall value.
Jacob Wheeler, Senior Solutions Architect with CloudWave delivered an impressive presentation on, “Cybersecurity Risk to Supp
ly Chain”. This session explored the challenges, considerations, and risks hospitals face as their supply chain footprint creates exponential cybersecurity risks to their organization. The main takeaways from the presentation were to learn actions that can be taken with your supply chain to reduce the risk of being impacted by an attack on your suppliers, and how to respond if one of your suppliers becomes the victim of an attack.
Premier’s 2024 Breakthroughs Conference
Premier’s Annual Breakthroughs Conference and Exhibition was held on July 23-25 at the Gaylord Resort in National Harbor, Maryland. This year’s theme was “UNITED” and all of the keynote sessions were centered around that concept
Premier’s President and CEO, Mike Alkire started things off with a keynote session titled, UNITED FRONT: Forging Partnerships for Breakthrough Performance where he spoke about having a united front to transform healthcare.
For the first time, UISS hosted a happy hour social on Tuesday evening, July 23. UISS members were invited to join the UISS/IHA staff and socialize with other UISS members attending the conference. While it was a small group, new friendships were made and networks formed.
UISS sponsored eleven (11) members from seven (7) different facilities to attend the national conference. These members were treated to three jam-packed days of exploring connections in the latest in technology, artificial intelligence, labor optimization, supplier innovation and more all offered throughout the conference in the general sessions or the many different CEU approved sessions available.
Attendees were captivated by the session, UNITED VIEWS: Bridging Science, Consumerism and Consciousness. Where three leading physicians, including Dr. Deepak Chopra, lead the talk about how to combine science, consumerism, and consciousness into a wholistic approach to healthcare. It was a packed house to hear award winning journalist, NY Times Best Selling Author, and Co-founder of “Stand Up to Cancer”, Katie Couric, discuss her journeys with cancer and her work to make others aware of this disease. Her foundation has raised over $750 million to support cutting edge science and cancer therapies.
Again, UISS was thrilled to have staff members from Samaritan Medical Center in Watertown, NY present at the conference.
- Jessica Goodrich
- Disaster Preparedness: The Role of the Infection Preventionist in Water Disruption
- Lance Bombard
- OperationsAdvisor® One Size Does Not Fit All: Using Operations Advisor Benchmarking for Laser Focus
Premier closed out the event with a concert/celebration by the Goo Goo Dolls! It was an outstanding three days filled with vendor exhibits, networking events, and educational sessions. We look forward to what Breakthroughs25 has in store. Mark your calendars; next year’s Breakthroughs Conference will be held July 15-17, 2025. Hope to see you there!
Employee Services Program (ESP) Update
UISS is pleased to welcome Bertrand Chaffee Hospital as the newest member of the Iroquois Employee Services Program (ESP). Bertrand Chaffee employees now have access to the hundreds of discounts and services that are specially packaged and offered to ESP members.
In these times of rapid employee turnover and healthcare worker shortages, there is a need to offer incentives to attract and retain good employees and the ESP is an extremely cost-effective solution to that issue without overwhelming your staff with added work.
To learn more about the Employee Services Program, contact Mary Brisson.