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Welcome to the SpendMend Blog! You’ll find tips & tricks, best practices, educational information and much more! Authored by SpendMend’s talented team and featured guests, new blogs are published often, so make sure to join our mailing list and share your favorites with your colleagues.
Financial Benefits of SpendMend’s Explanted Medical Device Warranty Credit Tracking Solution (MDWT)
By Al Brander, VP of Clinical Services The MDWT solution offers two significant financial benefits to hospitals and health systems: Cost Avoidance Non-compliance with the Prudent Buyer Standard, as mandated by CMS and enforced by the OIG, can result in severe fines...
The Unsettling Trend: Why 75% of C-suite Leaders are Contemplating Resignation
By Teri Harkins, VP of Sales An unfortunate trend has surfaced in the corporate world. Recent surveys suggest that an overwhelming 75% of C-suite leaders, including CEOs, CFOs, and CTOs, are considering stepping down from their positions. This wave of potential...
TRULLA by SpendMend: An Ideal Solution for Swelling Pharmacy Prices
By Jake Thompson, VP of Pharmacy Services, Optimization and Growth The rising costs of healthcare and prescription drugs continue to be a major concern for individuals, healthcare providers, and insurers alike. As projections indicate that healthcare costs are...
The Importance of a Recovery Audit in Healthcare
By David Hewitt, Senior VP of Sales A recovery audit in healthcare is an assessment of a healthcare system or hospital's financial processes and transactions. The goal of this audit is to identify opportunities to improve efficiency and recover any overpayments or...
The Paramount Importance of Patient Care: A Collective Responsibility
By Andrew Brandenburg, MBA Healthcare Cost-Savings & Cost-Recovery Expert The response to my last blog was great! Thank you all for your comments. The dialogue that followed has encouraged me to share a few more thoughts – and today – I have an important one. ...
How To Optimize Your Hospital’s Financial Performance Through Data Analytics
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager Data analytics has become an integral part of healthcare, allowing hospitals to optimize their financial performance and better serve their patients. By collecting and organizing data from various sources; analyzing the data with...
Revolutionizing Rebate Management: The Strategic Alliance of SpendMend and Rebate Insight
By Jonas Langvad, VP of Rebate Insight Product Solutions at SpendMend As the co-founder of Rebate Insight, I have been excited for the past several weeks to share the news of our recent acquisition by SpendMend, the leading provider of solutions to optimize the...
The Top 7 Changes to Expect in Healthcare in 2023
By Al Brander, CSO The healthcare industry is constantly evolving, and 2023 promises to bring a number of significant changes and developments. Here are the Top 7 changes to expect in healthcare in 2023: Increased adoption of telehealth services: The COVID-19...
Why Should Your Hospital Take Advantage of an Asset Recovery Audit?
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager An Asset Recovery audit is a comprehensive review of an organization's assets to identify and recover lost or underutilized assets. There are several reasons why your hospital should consider using an audit: Improve financial...
2,000 Audits and Counting: A Commitment to Serving Underserved Patient Communities
By Rob Nahoopii, SVP of Pharmacy Services The famous Greek philosopher Aristotle is believed to have written over 2,000 works during his lifetime, including influential texts on philosophy, science, and ethics. 2,000 works… can you believe it? Last week we announced...
Five Things To Consider When Selecting Your Next Recovery Audit Provider
By David Hewitt, Senior VP of Sales As a hospital administrator, you know firsthand the importance of managing your organization's finances effectively. One area where you can make a significant impact is in the accounts payable process, where even small errors or...
Industry Trends and Predictions for the Future of Hospital Finance
By Al Brander, CSO In this article, we will explore some of the key trends and predictions shaping the future of hospital finance, including the increasing cost pressure; the greater reliance on data analytics; changes in payment models: and the rise of telehealth....
Continuous Improvement in Healthcare Cost-Cycle: The Case for Ongoing Recovery Audits
By David Hewitt, Senior VP of Sales The healthcare industry is constantly evolving and the practice of conducting a one-time AP Recovery Audit may no longer be enough for healthcare organizations to optimize their cost-cycle processes and avoid missed opportunities....
SpendMend Achieved HITRUST i1 Certification… Why Does this Matter?
By Jeremy Toth, CTO As a trusted partner of top healthcare systems across the US, SpendMend understands the critical importance of data security in the healthcare industry. Earlier this month, we announced that we have completed HITRUST certification, the gold...
The Role of AP Recovery Audits in ERP Upgrades and Implementations
By Andrew Brandenburg, MBA Healthcare organizations face unique challenges when upgrading and/or implementing new ERP systems. These challenges include control gaps, legacy data inconsistencies, inefficient procurement processes, etc. An effective way to address...
The Key Pressure Points of Financial Leakage Healthcare
Written By: Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager, ksavage@spendmend.com The Three C’s The healthcare industry experiences some of the highest rates of financial leakage and (subsequent profit recovery) due to three key pressure points: Complexity, Compliance and...
How is SpendMend Just Like March Madness?!
By Brett Stuebinger, Senior Vice President, Client Value & Innovation March Madness, the annual college basketball tournament, is a thrilling whirlwind of competition, upsets, and nail-biting finishes. But how could SpendMend, the leading provider of cost-saving...
The Uncanny Similarities Between St. Patrick’s Day and SpendMend
By Tomás Ó Floinn ( Tom Flynn ), VP of Marketing St. Patrick's Day, a celebration of Irish culture, is known for its festive atmosphere, community gatherings, and bursts of vibrant green. But did you know that this beloved holiday has quite a bit in common with...
The Hidden Costs of False Positives: Why Preventative Profit Recovery Tools are Not Enough
By David Hewitt, Senior VP of Sales If your business is currently using a preventative profit recovery tool to address and reverse financial leakage, it's important to be aware of its limitations and drawbacks. While marketed as a comprehensive solution, these tools...
SpendMend Pharmacy 340B Legislative Update 2023
By Rob Nahoopie, PharmD, MS, ACE Greetings, 340B community! It’s been a while since my last blog article. For those who have been with us for many years, you may recall that prior to joining SpendMend and even before the inception of Turnkey Pharmacy Solutions, we had...
Maximizing Cost Savings: SpendMend’s Proven Approach to Reducing PPI Costs in Hospitals
By Lisa Miller, MHA As healthcare costs continue to rise, hospitals are under increasing pressure to find ways to reduce expenses without sacrificing the quality of patient care. One area where hospitals can achieve significant cost-savings is in the management of...
The Risks of DIY Asset Recovery and Unclaimed Property Reviews for Healthcare Organizations
By Teri Harkins, Regional VP of Sales In today's healthcare industry, financial optimization is a top priority for hospitals. While hospitals are focused on minimizing costs and maximizing profits, one area that is often overlooked is the management of unclaimed...
A Webinar of Substance…
By Al Brander, CSO Last week, I had the pleasure of hosting a webinar with two esteemed experts, Rob Nahoopii and Dr. David Shulkin. Our webinar, "Four Compliance Pitfalls that can Devastate your Hospital’s Margin in 2023," was a huge success, with many attendees...
Are You Missing the ‘Red Flags’ in Your Hospital’s Explanted Medical Device Warranty Credit Program?
By Al Brander, CSO Explanted Medical Device Warranty Credit Overpayments continue to be a hot topic for the OIG moving into 2023 as evidenced by the supplemental funding they received in 2022 and the increased number of provider audits in Q4. At SpendMend, we see...
So Proud to Announce Another Banner Year for SpendMend!
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager As a proud employee of SpendMend, I am thrilled to be a part of a company that is making such a significant impact on the healthcare industry. Our innovative cost-saving solutions have been helping hospitals and health systems across...
Why Should Your Hospital Use An Asset Recovery Audit?
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager Use an Asset Recovery audit as a comprehensive review of an organization's assets to identify and recover lost or underutilized assets. There are several reasons why your hospital should consider using an Asset Recovery audit:...
Do You Know How You Have Your Purchasing Contracts Loaded?
By: Heidi Larson, PharmD, 340B ACE Do you know and understand how contracts are loaded into your wholesaler accounts? As we move into FY23 of 340B Program HRSA audits, SpendMend has seen increased scrutiny on purchasing accounts and practices. This includes mixed-use...
Thanksgiving Wisdom for the Ages
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager Thanksgiving is an important holiday for SpendMend – we know we have so much to be thankful for. We are thankful for our employees; our employees’ families; our partners; our clients; and for the healthcare professionals that work...
Unclaimed Property and The 49.5 Billion Reasons Why Dark Data is A Bigger Problem Than You Think
By Teri Harkins, Regional VP of Sales - West At SpendMend, we focus a lot on dark data in healthcare. In 2019, Splunk.com published an influential article on the topic which identified dark data as “all of the unused, unknown and untapped data across an...
Is this the tipping point we’ve been hoping we wouldn’t see? Are you about to get audited by the OIG?
By Al Brander, CSO In the most direct terms, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has been asked by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) to increase their efforts when it comes to recouping Medicare overpayments from U.S. hospitals. Do you work...
A Sincere Thank You to Our Team Members During A Month Dedicated to Appreciation and Recognition
October is quite meaningful for SpendMend and for our clients. Nearly every week of this month is dedicated to celebrating some population of our client base. This year, October 2-8 was designated National Health Care Supply Chain Week; October 10-14 was assigned as...
Five Lessons from Last Week’s Company Meeting
Last week several hundred SpendMenders descended on our home office in Grand Rapids for our annual all hands meeting. We packed ourselves into a large conference room for a couple hours and we split time reviewing the past year’s accomplishments as well as our...
Why We Created the “340B Unscripted” Podcast
By Robert Nahoopii, PharmD, MS, ACE, Senior Vice President of Pharmacy Services at SpendMend You may have heard… and if you haven’t then you soon will. We are launching the “340B Unscripted” Podcast. Look for a much wider public announcement in a couple weeks! As we...
The Top Five Things I’ve Learned (so far) at the 2022 Trade Shows
By Alan Brander We’re almost halfway through June (can you believe it?) and the SpendMend team has been busy traversing the map and meeting clients and colleagues at trade shows and industry conferences across the country. At this point in the year our team has...
Change of Entity Type from Rural Hospital to DSH (April 2022)
By: Jennifer Hagen Is your hospital considering a change of entity type from Rural Hospital to DSH? Here are a few things to consider. The First thing your C-Suite will want to know is that this change of status will be for 340B purposes only and will NOT change the...
340B Referral Capture Program
By: Riley Protz Client Background Large non-profit hospital Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) with eligible child sites in Primary Care, Neurology, and An expansive contract pharmacy network of over 95 contracts Problem In line with the experiences of many...
SpendMend Team Members Attend Van Andel Institute Lunch and Learn
SpendMend Team Members Attend Van Andel Institute Lunch and Learn Written by: Hannah Geelhoed, Web/Graphic Developer and HR Assistant In April, I had the opportunity to attend a Lunch and Learn at the Van Andel Institute (VAI) with another member of the SpendMend...
The “What, What, What” of Medical Device Explants
By Joe Heminger, Business Development Representative The OIG listed on the 2022 workplan that they will be auditing the hospital’s medical device explants credit process and approved $50 million in funding for these audits. To give you a quick breakdown, we have...
How Can You Be Part of AP Appreciation Week?
By Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager Today marks the first day of the 4th annual AP Appreciation week! During this week, all of us, in and around the AP community take time to celebrate the hard work by everyone in the AP/P2P industry! AP Appreciation week was brought...
Your Healthcare System is Overlooking a Big Pile of Unclaimed Assets
By Teri Harkins, Vice President of Sales All healthcare organizations are at risk of suffering significant financial leakage due to complexity, compliance, and constant change. One often-overlooked area where healthcare systems are losing substantial dollars is in the...
Managing Procurement for Ineligible Locations
By Chelsea Violette and Rich Bucher A question we’ve received a number of times, in a few different ways is how to manage drug inventory across multiple locations, when you have a mix of 340B eligible and ineligible locations you need to provide drugs to but are...
Profit Recovery Audit in Healthcare – Do Not Delay in 2022!
You Should Not Delay Your 2022 Profit Recovery Audit in Healthcare - by Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager You really cannot delay the start of your profit recovery audit in healthcare. There is simply too much at stake – this year now more than ever. After...
Why Should Your Healthcare System Consider A Contract Compliance Audit?
Written by: David Hewitt, SVP of Sales Think about it… your organization does business with thousands of vendors. Most of these relationships are governed by one or more contracts. It is unlikely that your in-house team has the time or the specialized expertise to...
Where’s the Pothttps://www.spendmend.com/ of Gold for Rural Hospitals?
A recent report published by the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform – a national policy center focused on designing and implementing payment systems that support affordable, patient-centered health care – cited that over 500 rural hospitals are at...
HRSA Authority, Contract Pharmacies, Manufacturers and Covered Entities: The History of How We Got Here
In order to fully understand how we have gotten to the day when manufacturers are limiting contract pharmacy distribution of 340B drug; we need to understand the history– so let’s take a step back in time. In 1992, Congress created the 340B Drug Pricing Program to...
A Recovery Auditing Overview
Written By: Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager, ksavage@spendmend.com What is Recovery Auditing? Recovery Auditing, also known as an accounts payable (AP) audit, is a review of both your accounts payable historical data and your vendor’s accounts receivable (AR) records....
340B Winter Coalition 2022 – Congratulations on 30 Years! Continue to Share Your Story
For the first time in two years, an opportunity to attend the 340B Winter Coalition in person brought out a record number of attendees while also allowing virtual attendance as an option. 340B Health unveiled the new logo representing the 30-year evolution of covered...
340B Brick by Brick
Written by; Tom Flynn, VP of Marketing He straightened up a bit and spoke with a little extra bass in his voice, “Hell yeah, I’m proud of it. This is the biggest thing I’ve ever been a part of in my whole career.” Of every great thing I saw in San Diego last week at...
No, The Sales Rep Can NOT Take Care Of It For You
Written by: Al Brander RN MBA FACHE, Chief Sales Officer, SpendMend We speak to large healthcare systems all the time about their policy for managing medical device warranty credits after an explant procedure has taken place. Managing these credits is a laborious...
Are You Doing “Profit Recovery” All Wrong?
Written By: David Hewitt, RVP of Sales As of six years ago, we had 64 clients and nearly every one of them (over 90%) was doing a traditional profit recovery audit. Meaning, we were performing a review on our client’s historical AP data. Typically, we would go back...
ADAP: A Quest for Knowledge
When I was young, I remember my dad saying time and time again, “knowledge is power.” He was always on a quest to learn and to know why or how things worked. It was then, as he felt, his duty to educate my sisters and me. He would end his tutorial with “And now you...
Don’t Forget Referral Capture Strategies
Written By: Rich Bucher While implementing referral capture strategies can potentially lead to significant 340B savings for your 340B covered entity (CE), it is important to remember that you, the CE, remain responsible for ensuring full compliance. Managing a fully...
Build Back Better Act and 340B Impact
By Rob Nahoopii If you are like me, it feels like I have been on a roller coaster ride as I watch what is and what is not going to be included in the Social Reform Bill titled “Build Back Better Act” (BBBA) or H.R. 5376. I have also been having a hard time tracking...
How is SpendMend just like Halloween?
Written By Tom Flynn It's that time of year again… Halloween! In just a couple days, millions of children between the ages of 3 and 13 (and well beyond) will be dressing up as their favorite monster or princess or who-knows-what and scouring their neighborhoods to...
Price Validation for Pharmacists
Written By: Michelle Regnier, Business Development Manager, Pharmacy Services As a pharmacist, you’re asked to expand your area of expertise from time to time to negotiate pricing and terms with wholesalers and group purchasing organizations. You do your best to...
Go Ahead, Have Your Cake and Eat it Too!
Written By Chelsea Violette and Matt Parker Compliance is the foundation of a successful 340B program and, rightfully so, is the primary focus for most 340B covered entities. Often, this focus consumes most available staff and resources, leaving terms like...
SpendMend Dedicates Bee Brave 5k Fundraiser to Team Member
Written by: Hannah Geelhoed, Community Involvement Coordinator When I first joined the SpendMend team just over 5 years ago I was given the directive from the executive board to “get SpendMend more involved in the community”. This seemed like a broad venture to take...
OIG Report Overview: Hospitals Did Not Comply with Medicare Requirements for Reporting Cardiac Device Credits
Why The OIG Did This Audit The Office of Inspector General (OIG) OIG’s objective was to determine whether hospitals have complied with Medicare requirements for reporting manufacturer credits associated with recalled or prematurely failed cardiac devices. Concerns...
The Strange Case of Vanishing Invoices
Written By: David Hewitt Missing Invoices: The Problem Are you missing some of your vendors’ invoices? Is your RNI balance growing month after month? If you’re like most AP departments, you’re probably missing some percentage of your vendor invoices and this slow...
The Typical Points of Failure for Reporting Medical Device Credits
Written By: Joe Heminger, Business Development Manager The Office of Inspector General (OIG) performed a review of medical device credits to determine whether hospitals complied with Medicare requirements for reporting manufacturer credits associated with recalled or...
DSH Risk, Advocate, and Hope it is not needed, Steps to Terminate
“One-Fourth of 340B DSH Hospitals at Risk of Losing Eligibility Due to Pandemic, Analysis Finds.” This is a shocking headline that recently caught my eye as I was perusing the 340B Report. The article further goes on to explain that an analysis of hospital Medicare...
SpendMend Qualifies for Grand Rapids Business Hall of Fame
Written by: Kylee Savage I am so proud to report that SpendMend has been selected for the 2021 Grand Rapids Awards for Enhanced Audit Recovery by the Grand Rapids Award Program. SpendMend has received this award for three consecutive years and it now qualifies us for...
340B Program Excellence: A Year in Review
Written By: Rob Nahoopii This week marks exactly one year since Turnkey Pharmacy Solutions became a member of the SpendMend team. If I think back to that hectic time surrounding our transition, I remember sharing the news with several colleagues. Everyone was...
Is 340B Referral Capture Right For Your Organization?
Written By: Jake Thompson, jthompson@spendmend.com Earlier this month we announced that the 340B Referral Capture program has been made available to all current and new clients moving forward. Since this announcement, we have been receiving calls daily...
Making Sure Your Clean Site Is Clean
Similar to the often used phrase “be sure this is included in your policy and procedures”, auditors get the same satisfaction by telling folks that “this needs to be included as part of your routine self-auditing”. It is easy to assume clean sites don’t need much...
What Makes a Best-in-Class Recovery Audit Firm in Healthcare?
Written By; David Hewitt, RVP of Sales - East What are the basics for a Recovery Audit provider? At minimum your Recovery Audit firm should be checking all the following boxes. Working offsite/Remote access Online claims delivery Data files (AP, Vendor Master, PO,...
Why Is Your Process For Reporting Medical Device Credits Falling Short?
Written by: Joe Heminger, Business Development Manager So, why is your process for reporting medical device credits falling short? The Office of Inspector General (OIG) performed a review of cardiac device credits to determine whether hospitals complied with Medicare...
340B Contract Pharmacy Pricing Battle – It’s Plain For All To See!
If you are in the 340B space, then it is likely you are well aware of the 340B contract pharmacy pricing battle occurring between 6 manufacturers and Health and Human Services (HHS). Let’s do a quick update of how we got here and the recent monumental shift from HHS...
Memorial Day Remembrance
Memorial Day is the most poignant and bittersweet holidays in the United States. It’s the day dedicated to the fallen. Those who paid the ultimate sacrifice so the rest of us can enjoy the privilege and responsibility of freedom. Often seen as the official start of...
Happy AP Appreciation Week to AP Professionals Across the World!
Written By: Tom Flynn, VP of Marketing We wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge the Accounts Payable Association, their leader Jamie Radford and his superb team to thank them for hosting and promoting this year’s Accounts Payable Appreciation Week! It’s...
Referral Capture: Finding Additional Savings in Your 340B Program
Referral capture in the 340B world is not a new concept. What it requires is a Holmes and Watson investigative spirit, time, and most importantly…an eye focused to Compliance. In the 340B world, we live and die by the 340B patient definition. HRSA has given very...
The Typical Process of a Recovery Audit
Written by: Kylee Savage, Marketing Manager Every Recovery Audit firms offers a slightly different approach, but the general approach of most firms follows a similar pattern: Discovery —Each firm goes through an investigative or discovery phase in which the Recovery...
HIN What?
HIN What? Many of you have been following and evaluating your options as multiple manufacturers have restricted contract pharmacy pricing for CEs. You probably also received our email communication in February describing a few exception opportunities that exist for...
How is SpendMend Just Like the Easter Bunny?
Written By: Tom Flynn, VP of Marketing On Easter mornings when I was young, my parents used to hide plastic eggs all around the house with little surprises in them. Some eggs had chocolate candy inside. (I liked those) Some eggs had dental floss in them. (I didn’t...
Don’t Be Fooled… By Medical Device Non-Compliance!
Written By: Joe Heminger, Business Development Manager It’s April first and it’s hard enough to get through the day without some prankster trying to pull a fast on you. The last thing you want to do is fool yourself, but in our latest review of U.S. Health Systems, we...
How is SpendMend just like St. Patrick’s Day?
by Michael Koory, SpendMend, VP Sales - Mid-America Today marks St. Patty’s Day (a.k.a. the Feast of Saint Patrick) which is a cultural and religious holiday celebrated every year on 17th of March in Ireland and by Irish communities around the world. Over the...
ANALYSIS: COVID relief credits and COVID-related distractions clear the way for a 70% increase in transaction errors (and cashflow losses) at major U.S. Health Systems
Written By: Rob Heminger, President The Impact of COVID Relief Credits Last December I wrote an article about the impact of “COVID-19 Relief Credits” on healthcare. At the time, we were seeing that a significant percentage of healthcare suppliers were generating and...
340B and Fee-For-Service Medicaid AAC Requirements
A topic we have covered in our client newsletter in the past, but is long overdue for a full discussion is 340B actual acquisition cost (AAC) requirements for fee-for-service (FFS) Medicaid billing in many states. In 340B audits we perform for clients, we review the...
Top 4 IT Optimization Recommendations for 2021
Written by: Evan Katzman, OptiSave Demands on health systems’ Information Technology (IT) teams continue to grow exponentially. ERP and EMR implementations, integrations accompanying mergers and acquisitions, and securing an ever-expanding digital footprint are just a...
Recent HRSA Audit Trends: Supporting Documentation for Eligible Providers
Historically, HRSA auditors have requested a list of eligible providers from covered entities during HRSA audits. Recently, however, HRSA auditors have been requesting that covered entities upload documents demonstrating that, for each audited utilization record, the...
Observing Key 340B Program Savings Trends Based on Drug Spend
Written by: Jake Thompson, PharmD, MS, SpendMend VP of Pharmacy Services, Growth and Optimization Industry Observations In the past two years, my team and I have worked with over 50 distinct hospitals on drug spend optimization projects ranging in size from $300K up...
The Five Things You Need to Do To Prepare for an OIG Med Device Audit
Written By: Joe Heminger, SpendMend Marketing Manager The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in conjunction with the Office of Inspector General (OIG) have announced their intention to recoup over $1 Billion in improper payments. Your organization will...
Why I Left My Career as a Pharmacist to Become a Consultant and Help Other Hospitals
Written By: Jake Thompson, PharmD, MS, jthompson@spendmend.com Over the past 18+ years in pharmacy, I have constantly been changing roles within the sector. I have held pharmacy technician and intern roles in both retail and hospital settings. I have been a PGY1...
Don’t Miss Out On These Resources
The 340B Program is complicated. It’s intimidating, and let’s be honest, at times downright confusing, for newcomers and veterans alike. Those of us in the 340B world know that managing a successful 340B Program requires the juggling of what feels like a...
CMS Most Favored Nation Drug Payment Model – What You Need to Know
The end of 2020 is upon us, for better or worse, and the healthcare industry as a whole is envisioning a brighter 2021 ahead of us, especially with the availability of two new COVID-19 vaccines that could signal an end to the pandemic. But we want to make sure our...
COVID-19 Relief Credits May Be Disappearing Without Your Knowledge
Written by: Rob Heminger, President SpendMend partners with more than 100 healthcare systems spanning over 2700 hospitals across the U.S. In a given quarter, we receive several terabytes of client spend data comprising billions of dollars in transactions while at the...
Department of Health and Human Services-Office of Inspector General Released a New Report on Hospital Compliance for Reporting Cardiac Device Credits
Written by: Alan Brander, FACHE, abrander@spendmend.com As a follow up to previous audits of hospital compliance with Medicare requirements for reporting cardiac device credits between 2004 and 2016, the OIG conducted a new audit to assess if hospitals had shown...
Happy Thanksgiving From SpendMend
Written by: Dan Geelhoed, CEO and Rob Heminger, President 2020 has been an extremely challenging year for all of us and it can be difficult to find things to be thankful for with COVID-19 continuing to impact families and businesses. In light of these unprecedented...
Only Time Will Tell: Future Changes to the Affordable Care Act
By: Chelsea Violette, PharmD, BCPS, 340B ACE In 2010, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law, changing the approach to healthcare in the United States. These changes had far reaching impacts but for today, we’re going to focus on the implications the ACA...
The “Three C’s” of Financial Leakage in the Cost-Cycle
Written by: Kylee Savage Financial leakage in the cost-cycle occurs in every major organization across the globe. This is inevitable and no matter how many new systems you put in place, or how many vendors or consultants you engage to eliminate transaction errors,...
With OIG Waivers Lifted, Hospitals Face Steep Penalties at the Worst Time
On March 30, 2020, in reaction to the President’s declaration of a national health emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) waived several CMS and OIG program requirements and their related audits. Several months later...
SpendMend Supports Bee Brave Fundraiser To Help Raise Funds For Breast Cancer Research!
Written By Hannah Geelhoed, Community Involvement Director Over the past several years we have been fortunate at SpendMend. Our business has grown and we have added many new and talented team members that share our work ethic and our values. Success is not something...
Working Together – Establishing a 340B Oversight Committee
With so much activity occurring in the 340B space in recent months, including HRSA Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) related to 340B eligibility, hospital recertification, manufacturer developments around contact pharmacies, and the uncertainty of what lies ahead...
Fiscal Heroes to the Rescue — YOU Can Make a Difference
By: Tim Berkey We have all seen and heard countless examples of courage from front-line workers and other medical professionals during the Covid-19 pandemic. As our nation has experienced an unprecedented (in our era) medical challenge, we have found new respect for...
A Bird’s Eye View of the 340B Program
Written By: Rob Nahoopii, PharmD, MS, 340B ACE, Senior Vice President of Pharmacy Services The News Earlier this week, we announced that both Turnkey Pharmacy Solutions and ELEVATE340B have joined SpendMend. Read about it here. We couldn’t be more excited by the...
HRSA Hospital Recertification
It’s everyone’s favorite time of the year. No, not college football (still stings to think about that), but HRSA’s annual recertification for hospitals. This year, HRSA has provided updated registration and recertification requirements. This blog is not intended to...
“Internal Audit” can better support a hospital’s financial stability during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Written By: Dan Geelhoed The Ongoing Cost of COVID-19 The COVID-19 pandemic has driven revenues down for nearly every industry especially the healthcare industry. In particular, the widespread decision of practically all U.S. hospitals this past spring to suspend...
The Impact of COVID-19 on Hospital and Healthcare Construction
Written by: Curt Plyler, Principle at Fort Hill Associates The Problem Hospitals and healthcare networks invest large amounts of capital into construction projects every year. Managing these projects requires key personnel at the hospital to set a clear plan,...
Why I Do What I Do…
Written By: David Hewitt, RVP of Sales - East, SpendMend Remember, before this pandemic took over our lives, when we all used to travel to trades shows? Last year - about this time - I attended the AHRMM Health Care Supply Chain Conference in San Diego. I recall, we...
COVID-19 Critical Challenges Told By Healthcare P2P Staff
Written By: Amanda Geelhoed Papach, Marketing Director at SpendMend A few weeks ago, SpendMend created a COVID-19 Idea Exchange for Healthcare Finance, Internal Audit, Supply Chain, and Accounts Payable Departments. This Idea Exchange survey requested input about how...