When initially asked to participate in a case study for Hybrent and Medline, this was Emily Frazier’s response: “I would love to! I am a huge fan of Hybrent and believe that my relationship with Medline was an integral part of choosing to make the change.” We couldn’t wait to talk to her!
As Supply Chain Manager at OneCore Health, Emily Frazier entered a perfect storm…the organization was switching GPOs, losing the purchasing software it had been using because of the switch, and she had just been assigned a new Medline representative.
“The Medline rep realized our organization needed help and she spent every waking hour getting our account on track. She taught me how to access reports and gave me all the tools I needed to take over the account in a more proactive way. And since we were cutting ties with our current GPO, I asked our Medline rep for advice on purchasing software. She immediately recommended Hybrent,” said Emily. “I trusted her so much after everything she did for us that I automatically agreed to see a demo.”
When she saw the Hybrent demo, she was a little skeptical. “It looked too good to be true,” she laughed. But OneCore was down to the wire on the decision – its contract with the current GPO was ending and the organization was going to have to go through a GPO conversion and add a new purchasing software simultaneously…just a little stressful!
“It was a difficult transition, but every time I talk about Hybrent and my love for Hybrent – I can’t talk about it without bringing my implementation specialist into the conversation,” gushed Emily. “She was a wizard, she was magical, she was amazing, she worked so hard, she was so patient with me – and creative! We came up with a lot of creative solutions – for example,we couldn’t load pricing because I didn’t have the new GPO pricing yet, because it didn’t go live until the same day I went live with Hybrent. But she got us through it. It was a lot of work and she was amazing. I credit her for the implementation going successfully, for sure.”
Emily does admit they looked at other software systems, but there were several roadblocks. Ordering through their EMR was not an option as they had not upgraded that system to be paperless (that is OneCore’s current project). The software needed to integrate with OneCore’s AP system because they were having trouble with PO and invoice reconciliation and timely payments.
“The software platform we had been using was run by non-medical people, so they didn’t understand when I needed something exactly what I was looking for – they just couldn’t help me.” To make matters worse, it was time-consuming to get POs corrected or even an item ordered because she would email the company, the company would email back more questions and this would go on for days. “I had zero control over the system myself, it was almost a read-only situation where I couldn’t make changes myself. Even item descriptions! I had to send them an email to fix,” she laughed. “When I switched to Hybrent, my email quantity was cut by two-thirds, at least,” she said.
Medline is Emily’s prime vendor and along with the benefits of her GPO, she knows Medine is going to have better prices than any other supplier. “I order supplies, instruments, monitors – I even ordered a liposuction machine from them,” she says. “We are in the middle of building a new hospital so I am working closely with my Medline rep.”
One time Emily sent her Medline rep a basic list of instruments that the SPD (sterile processing department) wanted ordered – without any descriptions or item numbers. “I texted the list to my rep and the next morning I had a quote. It’s incredible – she is fantastic.” Emily added, “There has never been a time when I’ve texted or called her and she didn’t immediately respond. That says a lot.”
Implementation
Due to the complexity of the implementation along with the GPO conversion, Hybrent and Medline tag-teamed to make sure Emily and her team were very well taken care of. Medline set up a special projects team that connected with her every week to make sure contracts were connected to items she currently purchased. She wanted to keep her item library as clean as possible, so the Hybrent implementation specialist reached out to all of OneCore’s vendors to get its previous 12-month purchase history. “It was time consuming, but I wanted it to get done right,” Emily said.
Results
The biggest changes for OneCare was the time saved and efficiencies gained. “I can order supplies very quickly,” said Emily, “even from my phone while sitting on my couch at home! If I get called and someone says they need more oxygen ordered, I can create that order on my phone and first thing in the morning, the oxygen is delivered.”
She loves being able to use the barcode technology too. “With our old system, we’d have to go in line by line and search for the item, and it had to be done by vendor, which took forever,” she said. “With Hybrent, you don’t have to create purchase orders by vendor, Hybrent does it for you. You enter items you need or scan the barcode, put in the quantity and done. Anyone can do it – it doesn’t take a specialist to use the platform.”
She reiterates how her email has reduced dramatically since going live. “It’s amazing…life changing,” Emily said. “We are currently shopping for a new EMR and I already told my boss not to worry about the purchasing aspect of a new system…there is no way I am getting rid of Hybrent!”
Emily is very happy with Medline as her prime vendor and is grateful her rep recommended Hybrent. “When I do reference calls for Hybrent, the first thing I tell people considering the software is ‘It is what it looks like,’” she laughed. “I love it and would never use another system.”
She credits her Medline rep, the Hybrent rep and Hybrent implementation specialist for “making it happen.”
“It is everything I never knew I wanted!”