Premier and HSHS Expand Strategic Partnership to Advance Healthcare Performance and Mission-Driven Care
Premier, Inc. has announced an expanded strategic partnership with Hospital Sisters Health System (HSHS), a Catholic nonprofit healthcare system headquartered in Springfield, Illinois, as both organizations work to strengthen operational performance, financial sustainability and mission-driven care delivery.
The expanded agreement is intended to support HSHS as it enters its next phase of organizational performance and transformation. By bringing together supply chain capabilities, data and analytics, advisory services and clinical and operational improvement resources, the partnership is designed to help HSHS better connect its financial, operational and clinical priorities.
The healthcare industry continues to experience significant pressure from rising costs, workforce challenges, changing patient needs and increasing complexity across care delivery. For nonprofit health systems in particular, maintaining financial strength while continuing to provide high-quality care can require organizations to find new opportunities to improve efficiency and stewardship.
Through the expanded relationship, HSHS will gain broader access to Premier’s healthcare improvement capabilities, including its group purchasing program, integrated data and analytics solutions, supply chain services, advisory resources, collaboratives and other technology-enabled tools.
The goal is to help HSHS identify opportunities for improvement, measure results and connect operational initiatives with patient care and organizational outcomes.
Supporting HSHS’s next phase of transformation
HSHS selected Premier following a rigorous due diligence process, according to Nalin Kulasekara, System Vice President of Ancillary Operations and Supply Chain Management at HSHS.
Kulasekara said the expanded partnership will help the organization advance its performance and transformation priorities while continuing to focus on its mission of serving patients and communities.
“Following a rigorous due diligence process, HSHS selected Premier to help advance HSHS’s next phase of performance and transformation,” Kulasekara said.
He added that the agreement is intended to strengthen operational performance and stewardship while supporting the organization’s broader mission.
For HSHS, the partnership represents an effort to approach performance improvement as an integrated process rather than treating supply chain, clinical operations and financial management as separate areas.
Connecting these functions can allow healthcare organizations to better understand how decisions in one area affect outcomes in another. For example, supply chain decisions can influence clinical workflows and costs, while clinical variation can affect both resource utilization and financial performance.
An integrated approach can help health systems identify improvement opportunities while maintaining their focus on quality and patient care.
Healthcare organizations face growing operational pressures
Health systems across the United States are operating in an increasingly complex environment.
Healthcare providers must manage inflationary pressures, higher labor expenses, supply costs, evolving reimbursement models and increasing expectations around quality and patient outcomes. At the same time, healthcare organizations must continue investing in technology, infrastructure and workforce development.
These pressures can make it difficult for health systems to balance immediate operational needs with longer-term strategic goals.
Supply chain management has become particularly important as organizations look for ways to control costs while maintaining access to the products and equipment clinicians need to provide care.
Clinical operations also require ongoing attention as health systems seek to reduce unnecessary variation, improve efficiency and maintain consistent standards.
Financial resilience is similarly important. Health systems need reliable processes for identifying improvement opportunities and measuring the value generated by those initiatives.
Premier and HSHS intend to address these challenges through a partnership model that connects multiple dimensions of healthcare performance.
Expanding access to Premier’s capabilities
Under the expanded agreement, HSHS will have access to several areas of Premier’s platform and services.
These include Premier’s group purchasing program, integrated data and analytics, supply chain solutions, advisory services, collaboratives and other performance-improvement resources.
Group purchasing can help healthcare organizations leverage collective purchasing power when acquiring medical supplies, equipment and other products and services.
Data and analytics capabilities can provide health system leaders with information needed to identify performance trends, evaluate opportunities and monitor progress.
Advisory services can complement those technology and purchasing capabilities by providing expertise to help organizations translate information into action.
Together, these resources are intended to provide HSHS with a more connected approach to performance management.
Three strategic areas of focus
The expanded partnership will center on three primary areas: supply chain optimization, clinical and operational improvement, and financial resiliency.
Supply chain optimization
The first area focuses on strengthening HSHS’s supply chain operations.
HSHS and Premier already have an existing quality and analytics relationship. The expanded partnership will build on that foundation through a centralized and integrated platform designed to connect supply chain, clinical and financial data.
This connection is important because supply chain performance can have implications well beyond procurement.
The products and services purchased by hospitals can affect clinical workflows, operating expenses and patient care. By connecting supply chain information with clinical and financial data, leaders can gain a broader understanding of how purchasing decisions influence the organization.
An integrated approach may also help identify opportunities to reduce unnecessary spending, improve standardization and strengthen purchasing practices without compromising the quality of care.
The objective is not simply to reduce costs but to improve stewardship of resources while ensuring clinicians have the supplies and tools necessary to care for patients.
Clinical and operational improvement
The second focus area is clinical and operational performance.
Healthcare organizations frequently face differences in how care is delivered across departments, facilities and providers. Some variation may be clinically appropriate, while other variation can represent an opportunity to improve efficiency, consistency or outcomes.
Premier and HSHS will work to identify opportunities to reduce unnecessary variation and strengthen care delivery.
The partnership also aims to connect cost-improvement initiatives with quality and patient outcomes.
This is an important distinction for healthcare organizations because financial improvement cannot be considered in isolation from clinical performance. A cost-reduction strategy that negatively affects care quality would not support the long-term goals of a mission-driven health system.
By linking operational initiatives to quality and outcomes, HSHS can seek improvements that support both financial stewardship and patient care.
Strengthening financial resiliency
The third focus area is financial resiliency.
Financial sustainability is increasingly important for healthcare organizations as they navigate higher expenses and changing operating conditions.
The expanded Premier-HSHS relationship will support efforts to identify financial improvement opportunities and align initiatives with measurable value.
Using data and analytics can help organizations identify areas where resources may be used inefficiently or where processes could be redesigned.
The emphasis on measurable value is also intended to make it easier for leadership teams to assess whether improvement initiatives are producing the expected results.
For a nonprofit healthcare system such as HSHS, financial stewardship is closely connected to its ability to fulfill its mission. Stronger operational and financial performance can provide greater flexibility to invest in patient services, employees, technology and community needs.
Connecting finance, operations and clinical care
Premier’s leadership emphasized the importance of integrating different areas of healthcare performance.
Dr. Emad Rizk, Premier’s Chief Executive Officer, President and Chairman of the Board, said health systems need more than incremental improvements to address today’s challenges.
“Health systems today need more than incremental improvements,” Rizk said. “They need a true partner that executes on aligned strategies connecting operations, finance and clinical performance.”
This approach reflects a broader shift in healthcare management toward integrated performance improvement.
Rather than pursuing isolated cost-reduction projects, health systems increasingly need to understand how operational changes influence clinical outcomes, workforce performance and financial results.
The partnership with HSHS is intended to provide a framework for that type of coordinated approach.
Rizk said the work with HSHS will focus on helping teams move more quickly, operate more effectively and continue supporting their mission.
Supporting mission-driven healthcare
HSHS operates as a Catholic nonprofit healthcare system, meaning its financial and operational priorities are closely connected to its broader mission of serving patients and communities.
For mission-driven organizations, performance improvement can involve more than achieving financial targets. It can also mean ensuring resources are used responsibly so that the organization can continue providing services to patients and communities over the long term.
The expanded partnership is designed around this concept of stewardship.
By identifying opportunities across supply chain, clinical operations and finance, HSHS aims to strengthen the foundation supporting its care delivery model.
The relationship also recognizes that healthcare performance is interconnected. Improvements in one area can potentially create benefits in another, provided initiatives are carefully planned and measured.
Data as a foundation for decision-making
Data and analytics will play an important role in the expanded partnership.
Healthcare systems generate substantial amounts of information through clinical activity, purchasing, financial operations and other processes. Bringing that information together can help leadership teams gain a clearer picture of organizational performance.
An integrated data platform can potentially make it easier to identify trends, compare performance and prioritize opportunities.
For supply chain leaders, data can provide insight into purchasing patterns and utilization. For clinical teams, analytics can help identify variations in care delivery. For financial leaders, data can highlight areas where operational changes may improve performance.
The ability to connect these perspectives can support more informed decision-making.
A collaborative approach to improvement
The expanded partnership also includes access to Premier’s collaboratives, which can provide opportunities for healthcare organizations and professionals to share experiences and learn from peers.
Collaboration can be particularly valuable in an industry where organizations often face similar challenges but may approach them in different ways.
Sharing successful strategies can help health systems identify approaches that may be adapted to their own operating environments.
For HSHS, access to broader healthcare expertise and collaborative resources can complement its internal teams and support the implementation of its transformation priorities.
The partnership is therefore designed not simply as a technology or purchasing arrangement, but as a broader performance-improvement relationship.
Creating value for patients and communities
Kathy Donovan, Chief Operating Officer at HSHS, said the organization expects the expanded relationship to create meaningful value for patients, colleagues and the communities it serves.
“We are confident this move will create meaningful value for our patients, colleagues and the communities we serve,” Donovan said.
That objective reflects the broader purpose behind the partnership.
Operational improvements can affect patients by helping healthcare organizations maintain services, manage resources and improve care delivery. Employees can benefit from more efficient processes and better-connected systems, while communities can benefit when health systems remain financially and operationally sustainable.
For HSHS, the ability to maintain that balance will be important as the organization navigates a changing healthcare environment.
The expanded partnership between Premier and HSHS represents a broader effort to align healthcare performance improvement with the demands of modern care delivery.
By combining supply chain optimization, clinical and operational improvement and financial resiliency, the organizations aim to create a more integrated approach to performance management.
The partnership will build on HSHS’s existing relationship with Premier while expanding access to additional technology, data, analytics, advisory and purchasing capabilities.
The focus on measurable value is also expected to help HSHS evaluate the impact of improvement initiatives and prioritize areas that can produce sustainable benefits.
As healthcare organizations continue to face rising costs, workforce pressures and operational complexity, partnerships that connect financial, clinical and operational strategies may become increasingly important.
For HSHS, the expanded relationship is intended to support its next stage of transformation without losing sight of its core mission.
For Premier, the partnership represents an opportunity to work alongside a major nonprofit health system to address some of the industry’s most pressing performance challenges.
Ultimately, the expanded agreement is centered on a simple but increasingly important objective: helping healthcare organizations operate more effectively while preserving their ability to deliver high-quality, mission-driven care.
By connecting supply chain data with clinical and financial information, strengthening operational performance and identifying opportunities for financial improvement, HSHS and Premier aim to build a stronger foundation for sustainable healthcare delivery.
The partnership’s success will ultimately be measured not only by financial or operational improvements, but by its ability to support patients, healthcare professionals and communities. As HSHS moves forward with its transformation efforts, the collaboration with Premier is expected to play a role in helping the organization navigate an increasingly demanding healthcare environment while continuing to fulfill its mission.
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