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S. HRG. 109–522

HOSPITAL GROUP PURCHASING:

ARE THE INDUSTRY’S REFORMS SUFFICIENT TO

ENSURE COMPETITION?

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ANTITRUST, 

COMPETITION POLICY AND CONSUMER RIGHTS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

MARCH 15, 2006

Serial No. J–109–65

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

JON KYL, Arizona 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina 

JOHN CORNYN, Texas 

SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

MICHAEL O’NEILL, Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

BRUCE A. COHEN, Democratic Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ANTITRUST, COMPETITION POLICY AND CONSUMER RIGHTS

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio, Chairman 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina 

SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

PETER LEVITAS, Majority Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

JEFFREY MILLER, Democratic Chief Counsel 

(III)

C O N T E N T S

STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS

Page 

Brownback, Hon. Sam, a U.S. Senator from the State of Kansas, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 49

DeWine, Hon. Mike, a U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio ................................ 1

Kohl, Hon. Herbert, a U.S. Senator from the State of Wisconsin ....................... 3

Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 71

Schumer, Hon. Charles E., a U.S. Senator from the State of New York ............ 17

WITNESSES 

Bednar, Richard J., Coordinator, Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative, Washington, D.C. .................................................................................... 5

Leahey, Mark B., Executive Director, Medical Device Manufacturers Association, Washington, D.C. ......................................................................................... 7

Sethi, S. Prakash, Professor of Management, Baruch College, The City University of New York, New York, New York ....................................................... 8

Ubbing, Mina, President and Chief Executive Officer, Fairfield Medical Center Lancaster, Ohio .............................................................................................. 10

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 

Responses of S. Prakash Sethi to questions submitted by Senators DeWine, 

Sessions, and Kohl ............................................................................................... 21

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

Bednar, Richard J., Coordinator, Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative, Washington, D.C., prepared statement ................................................. 33

Blumenthal, Richard, Attorney General, State of Connecticut, Hartord, Connecticut, prepared statement .............................................................................. 45

Everard, Lynn James, Healthcare Strategist, prepared statement .................... 50

Hospital group purchasing organizations, joint statement .................................. 52

Kennedy, Daniel E., President and Chief Executive Officer, Riddle Memorial 

Hospital, Media, Pennsylvania, letter ................................................................ 59

Leahey, Mark B., Executive Director, Medical Device Manufacturers Association, Washington, D.C., prepared statement ..................................................... 61

LoBiondo, Al, Chairman, Health Industry Group Purchasing Association, Chicago, Illinois, letter .............................................................................................. 72

Novation, Mark McKenna, President and Chief Executive Officer, Irving, 

Texas, letter .......................................................................................................... 75

OhioHealth, David P. Blom, President and Chief Executive Officer, Columbus, 

Ohio, letter ............................................................................................................ 80

Premier Purchasing Partners, Susan D. DeVore, President, Washington, D.C., 

letter ...................................................................................................................... 81

Retractable Technologies, Inc., Thomas J. Shaw, President & CEO, Little 

Elm, Texas, prepared statement and attachments ........................................... 84

Sethi, S. Prakash, Professor of Management, Baruch College, The City University of New York, New York, New York, prepared statement and attachments ..................................................................................................................... 92

Ubbing, Mina, President and Chief Executive Officer, Fairfield Medical Center Lancaster, Ohio, prepared statement and attachment ............................... 110

(1)

HOSPITAL GROUP PURCHASING: ARE THE INDUSTRY’S REFORMS SUFFICIENT TO ENSURE COMPETITION? 

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 15, 2006 

U.S. SENATE, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ANTITRUST, COMPETITION POLICY AND

CONSUMER RIGHTS, OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:07 p.m., in room 

SD–226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Mike DeWine, 

Chairman of the Subcommittee, presiding. 

Present: Senators DeWine, Kohl and Schumer. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE DEWINE, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF OHIO 

Chairman DEWINE. Good afternoon. We welcome all of you to the 

Antitrust Subcommittee hearing on hospital group purchasing organizations. This is the fourth hearing in the last few years that 

the Subcommittee has held on these organizations, known as 

GPOs. 

I think it is fair to say that this is the most extensive investigation this Subcommittee has done, and I think to some of our friends 

in the industry it has felt much too extensive. But we have focused 

so much time and energy on it because of the importance of this 

industry to the health of our economy and, of course, to the health 

of our citizens. 

The purpose of this hearing this afternoon is to evaluate where 

we stand today. Is this industry competitive or is legislation required to inject competition into the industry? As we have discussed before, GPOs are simply organizations that manage purchasing of medical equipment and supplies for most of our Nation’s 

hospitals. Their ability to combine the purchasing power of the hospitals makes them an important part of the health care market. 

Today, we will be evaluating current industry practices, as well 

as considering a number of legislative proposals for other ways that 

the industry could operate. I think a brief review of this Subcommittee’s activity in this area will help to explain the various 

proposals. 

We held our first hearing on GPOs in April 2002. We did it because of complaints of ethical violations in the industry and also 

a more general complaint that the GPO system sometimes decreased the flexibility of hospital purchasing and made it difficult 

for doctors and nurses to get the best medical equipment. We 

2

found, unfortunately, that both of these allegations had some 

merit. 

During the course of our ongoing investigation, we also assessed 

a number of contracting practices, such as sole-source contracts, 

discounts based on high commitment levels, and bundling of clinical preference products with commodity products. All of these 

practices have positive aspects, but also may cause competitive difficulties. 

Our analysis of the industry has been complicated further by the 

so-called safe harbor that underlies this industry. GPOs have an 

unusual business model. They are funded not by their member hospitals, but rather by their suppliers. In other words, GPOs agree 

to purchase equipment and supplies from certain companies and as 

part of those contracts, the suppliers pay an administrative fee 

based on the size of the contract which is used to fund the existence of the GPOs. 

Under normal circumstances, this would be considered a kickback, and so the GPOs require an exemption from the anti-kickback laws. We have been told this safe harbor is what allows the 

GPO industry to exist in its current form. However, this relationship between the GPOs and the manufacturers have led many to 

distrust the purchasing decisions that GPOs make because, in effect, they benefit from larger contracts which are easier to sign 

with larger suppliers. 

Despite the complexity of these issues, our efforts have paid off. 

Senator Kohl and I worked with the industry to resolve the ethical 

violations we uncovered. We also made some progress in assessing 

the various contracting practices and worked with individual GPOs 

as they agreed to adopt voluntary codes of conduct. And the good 

news is that the voluntary codes of conduct helped matters somewhat. 

Smaller manufacturers seem to have greater access to the market, and the industry generally is more aware of the potential problems and has been taking steps to avoid additional problems. 

Under these circumstances, the Subcommittee has turned its focus 

to ensuring the permanence of the industry’s reforms, and Senator 

Kohl and I introduced Senate bill 2880 last term as an effort to do 

that. 

Senate bill 2880 would have given oversight of this industry to 

the Department of Health and Human Services, charging it with 

drafting rules for this industry to ensure that each GPO conformed 

with principles of competition, ethical standards and the goal of 

maintaining access to products necessary for proper patient care. If 

a GPO failed to follow these rules, it could lose its exemption from 

the safe harbor under that proposed legislation. 

The GPO industry objected to this approach, and to address its 

concerns we agreed to hold off on introducing this legislation and 

allow them the opportunity to develop a method for ensuring their 

changes would be implemented effectively in a permanent way. The 

industry response is the so-called, quote, ‘‘Hospital Group Purchasing Industry Initiative,’’ end of quote. This measure has been 

in place since July 2005, and it won’t surprise our witnesses to 

hear some like it and some don’t. 

3

So today we are holding this hearing to consider whether the initiative has been effective at promoting competition in the industry, 

and we will consider what future steps, if any, are necessary to ensure that the reforms will be permanent and actively enforced. To 

this end, we will look not only at the effect of the initiative, but 

also at S. 2880, as well as two other proposals. 

One of these proposals, which we are tentatively calling the individual code proposal, would empower Health and Human Services 

to codify and enforce the individual voluntary codes of conduct created by each specific GPO and set minimum standards for the 

codes. Another option is simply to repeal the safe harbor. 

Now, before I turn to Senator Kohl, I would like to add that 

throughout this ongoing process I have kept in close contact with 

hospitals in my home State of Ohio, and I think it is fair to say 

that nearly all the hospitals in Ohio that I have spoken with are 

confident that their GPOs are saving them money. In this era of 

skyrocketing health care costs, this is obviously a very critical consideration and one that this Subcommittee understands very well. 

Our goal has been and will continue to be to promote vigorous 

competition which will ensure that GPOs both save money and 

allow new and improved technologies to get to the market to help 

medical professionals better care for all of us. We must strike the 

right balance and we are committed to doing just that. 

Let me now turn to Senator Kohl, who has taken a very active 

role in this issue. 

Senator Kohl. 

STATEMENT OF HON. HERBERT KOHL, A U.S. SENATOR FROM 

THE STATE OF WISCONSIN 

Senator KOHL. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. Today, as you 

pointed out, we will consider what steps remain to be taken to ensure that competition prevails in hospital purchasing so that the 

abuses our Subcommittee uncovered in the last several years never 

return. We will need to carefully consider the industry’s latest efforts at self-regulation. We will also examine possible legislative alternatives that we have drafted should the industry’s efforts fall 

short. 

The last year has witnessed important developments for all of us 

who care about competition in hospital purchasing. At the behest 

of our Subcommittee, the industry has created a new organization 

to set standards and monitor the purchasing activities of hospital 

group purchasing organizations. The purpose of this new industry 

initiative is to ensure that GPOs do not engage in anticompetitive 

or unethical practices that freeze out new and innovative medical 

device manufacturers from the hospital market. 

The founders of this new industry initiative, the Nation’s largest 

and most influential GPOs, are to be commended for voluntarily 

forming this organization. The goals of this organization and the 

goals of the work of this Subcommittee over the last 4 years are 

central to American health care, namely ensuring that physicians, 

patients and health care workers have access to the best and the 

safest medical devices, devices that can literally make the difference between life and death. 

4

The final question that remains for us to consider is whether the 

organization is strong enough to do the job. The founders of the industry initiative now argue that the creation of this organization 

means that we need to do nothing more, that we can rely entirely 

on the initiative to guarantee an open and honest marketplace. 

They argue that any further legislation is not necessary. 

In order to assess this claim, at least two vital questions must 

be answered. First, is this organization really up to monitoring 

what is taking place in this enormous multi-billion-dollar industry? 

And, second, does this voluntary industry initiative contain sufficient sanctions to prevent wrongdoing and to penalize those GPOs 

that violate its founding principles? 

Any industry plan must include real and meaningful sanctions if 

any GPO violates ethical principles or the rules of free competition. 

In an industry as important to health and safety as the purchasing 

of medical equipment for critically ill patients, half-measures which 

do not assure that the best medical devices are available for patients are simply not acceptable. 

We have legislative tools available should we conclude that the 

industry initiative falls short. In the last Congress, Senator 

DeWine and I introduced the Medical Device Competition Act. This 

legislation will give the Department of Health and Human Services 

the authority to forbid GPO business practices which are anticompetitive or unethical. 

Other commentators have suggested an alternative approach, 

namely to forbid GPOs from receiving payments from hospital suppliers. Advocates of this approach argue that such a prohibition 

would remove an inherent conflict of interest in the present system. No longer would hospital vendors pay the very organizations 

that are supposed to negotiate with these vendors to get the best 

deal for their hospitals. We will therefore need to pay close attention to the testimony of our witnesses today as we evaluate whether we need to take any further steps. 

Before closing, I must express my disappointment that no representatives of the GPO industry accepted our invitation to testify 

here today. GPOs’ willingness to provide us with candid answers 

is a factor we will evaluate in determining whether self-regulation 

will suffice. We do thank the witnesses who are testifying for coming here today to testify, and we look forward to hearing their 

views. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman DEWINE. Thank you, Senator Kohl. 

Let me just say that I am also sorry that we don’t have any of 

the GPOs here today. After this hearing, I would like to announce 

that we will send them each a letter from the Subcommittee asking 

for their input about each of the proposals that we will be discussing today. We look forward to their input. I think their input 

is very, very important. We will invite them to give us that input 

and their point of view on that. 

I have Senator Leahy’s statement which I would ask at this point 

unanimous consent to make a part of the record, and it will be 

made a part of the record at this point. 

We will now turn to our panel. Richard Bednar is senior counsel 

in the law firm of Crowell and Moring and he currently serves as 

5

the coordinator of the Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative. He is also the coordinator of the Defense Industry Initiative 

on Business Ethics and Conduct, and has served on the U.S. Sentencing Commission. 

Mark Leahey is executive director for the Medical Device Manufacturers Association, the national trade association that represents over 200 manufacturers of medical devices, diagnostic products and health care information systems. 

Prakash Sethi is University Distinguished Professor of Management and President of the International Center for Corporate Accountability at Baruch College, at the City University of New York. 

Mina Ubbing is the President and CEO of Fairfield Medical Center, in Lancaster, in my home State of Ohio. She has been with the 

Fairfield Medical Center since 1979, serving in a number of roles, 

from internal auditor and accounting manager to currently serving 

as its CEO. 

We welcome all of you, and let me turn now to our first witness, 

Mr. Bednar. 

STATEMENT OF RICHARD J. BEDNAR, COORDINATOR, 

HEALTHCARE GROUP PURCHASING INDUSTRY INITIATIVE, 

WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. BEDNAR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senator Kohl. Mr. 

Chairman, I think you have adequately summarized my current 

position with the law firm and with the industry associations that 

I work with as a coordinator. 

I have been the coordinator of the Healthcare Group Purchasing 

Industry Initiative for 3 months, but I must add quickly that I 

have had well over 30 years of experience in working with other 

organizations in helping to develop organizational compliance and 

ethics programs. And I am very pleased to be with you today and 

to give you assurance that the Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative is off to a strong success. 

The initiative was launched in May of 2005 by the CEOs of nine 

leading GPOs. The initiative is a permanent, all-voluntary, selfgoverning organization committed to the highest level of ethical 

conduct and providing the best and safest products to patients, doctors and health care workers at competitive prices. For brevity, I 

will refer to this initiative simply as the GPO initiative or the initiative. 

The GPO initiative has three main purposes. First, it is intended 

to nurture and promote an ethical culture of compliance within 

every organization in the GPO industry. Second, the initiative promotes self-governance as the means by which each GPO’s top-level 

commitment to abide by ethical standards is controlled. Third, the 

initiative enforces a requirement that each member of the organization share best practices in dealing with ethics and business conduct issues. This sharing of practices is done both informally by 

regular communication among the compliance officers as issues 

arise and by participating in an annual best practices forum. 

To achieve these purposes, each GPO has pledged, first, to follow 

six core ethical principles; second, to report annually on adherence 

to these principles by responding to a public accountability questionnaire; and, third, to participate with other GPO representatives 

6

and interested parties in an annual best practices forum. The initiative is governed by a steering committee of the nine founding 

GPOs, who are, in effect, our board of directors. 

Each signatory is required to follow six principles: first, to have 

and adhere to a written code of business conduct which establishes 

high ethical values and sound business practices; second, to conduct learning within the organization as to personal responsibilities 

under the code. 

Third, each signatory is committed to work toward the goals of 

high-quality health care and cost-effectiveness. Fourth, each signatory is committed to work toward an open and competitive purchasing process, free of conflicts of interest and undue influence. 

Each signatory is responsible to each other to share best practices 

in implementing the principles, and each signatory, importantly, is 

accountable to the public. 

The public accountability process requires that each member organization annually respond to a detailed questionnaire, which responses are displayed publicly on our website. And I must add that 

we have done that with the responses to the first annual questionnaire which were posted on our website for all to see a bare 2 

months ago, and in that bare 2 months we have had over 26,000 

visits to that website, to those postings, indicating a very strong 

public interest in what the GPO companies are about. 

On January 11, 2006, the GPO initiative held its second steering 

Committee meeting. All nine of the founding GPO CEOs were 

there. I was there to witness it and I was there to see their enthusiasm and the energy that they manifested for this initiative. Then 

on January 12th and 13th, the initiative held its first best practices 

forum, about which I have described in greater detail for the 

record. 

In the future, Congress can expect sustained, extensive transparency from the GPO initiative, and significant open debate about 

its practices. This self-governance process will work. The CEOs believe in ethical leadership as the best way to introduce ethical business conduct within their organizations. The CEOs do not believe 

in out-sourcing this responsibility. Already, participation in the initiative—

Chairman DEWINE. Mr. Bednar, could you close? We have a vote 

at three o’clock and we are going to lose this entire hearing, so everybody has 5 minutes. 

Mr. BEDNAR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We do believe that the 

voluntary effort will serve the goals that have been articulated by 

this Committee and that no legislation is required. I look forward 

to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bednar appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman DEWINE. We appreciate it. Thank you very much, sir. 

Thank you. I thought you were getting close. 

Mr. Leahey. 

7

STATEMENT OF MARK B. LEAHEY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

MEDICAL DEVICE MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Mr. Chairman, Senator Kohl, on behalf of the hundreds of innovative medical technology manufacturers MDMA represents, I want to thank you for your continued efforts to ensure 

that patients and caregivers have access to the best technologies at 

the best price. This industry is founded on physicians and engineers working together to enhance the quality of care. Unfortunately, patients and caregivers don’t always have access to these 

products. 

When this Subcommittee held its first hearing in October 2002, 

witnesses testified about troubling GPO practices, including but 

not limited to exclusive contracts, excessive fees and corporate conflicts of interest. At that time, we heard the GPOs say we can reform ourselves. Yet, today we find ourselves back in this hearing 

room for the fourth time in as many years. 

And while I would like to testify that the GPOs have corrected 

their exclusionary practices, this is simply not the case. GPOs continue to bundle unrelated products and companies, execute longterm sole-source contracts, award no-bid contracts, collect excessive 

fees, and police the markets for the dominant suppliers in a way 

that excludes innovative, cost-effective technologies. And as a result, patients, caregivers and the American taxpayer are all suffering. 

Now, despite the steadfast efforts of this Subcommittee, significant problems remain. Just last year, the Health and Human Services Inspector General looked at this very issue and the results 

were staggering. The IG found that six GPOs collected $2.3 billion 

in administrative fees from the vendors, and their operating expenses were a whopping $725 million. 

These GPOs, I remind you, manufacture no product, nor do they 

distribute any product. You may ask where the rest of the money 

goes. Well, the GPOs would have you believe they return that back 

to their member hospitals. But the IG found otherwise. The IG 

found that GPOs siphoned off nearly $500 million for their own 

purposes, including for-profit business ventures. The IG also found 

that the hospitals receiving these funds—the majority of them did 

not reflect these admin fees in their cost reports to Medicare. 

GAO reports and court evidence also challenge the premise that 

the GPOs are focused on getting the best products at the best price. 

And why would they, given the current fee structure? The more a 

hospital pays, the more money the GPO makes. 

In addition to the fact that the current fee structure creates a 

disincentive to lower costs, it also provides select dominant suppliers the opportunity to buy exclusivity. In a recent antitrust case, 

it was shown that the president of a supply company met with a 

GPO executive in May of 2003 and this vendor executive stated 

that his company did $345 million in business with the GPO in the 

previous year and they paid the GPO $31 million in administrative 

fees. Now, that is nearly 9 percent, well above what the GPOs 

would have you believe they collect. And as an attorney said in the 

court case, when you tip the doorman that well, he is sure to keep 

8

folks out of the building. And unfortunately this is happening with 

the GPOs. 

Documents in this case also showed that suppliers pay fees above 

and beyond the administrative fee. In fact, in a particular product 

category the dominant supplier paid the GPO 15.5 percent in fees 

for an exclusive contract for a sole source contract. However, if the 

markets were opened up and they needed to compete, the vendor 

was only willing to pay the GPO 4 percent in fees. This scenario 

is precisely why the GPOs are tempted to enter into exclusive contracts with dominant suppliers. They are prisoners to the fees. 

And, remember, the $31 million payment was from one vendor to 

one GPO for 1 year. Imagine what the impact is nationally to 

health care costs. 

Now, GPOs claim that they can fix this problem among themselves, when evidence suggests otherwise. So long as the GPOs are 

allowed to sell restricted access to dominant suppliers by collecting 

payments from the largest vendors, patients, hospitals and taxpayers all lose out. 

The GPOs will also claim that they need more time. Unfortunately, patients, caregivers and the American taxpayer don’t have 

more time. But thankfully, Mr. Chairman, Senator Kohl, there is 

a solution. If you repeal the GPO safe harbor that Congress created 

nearly 20 years ago under much different circumstances, you will 

restore competition back in the marketplace and ensure that the 

GPOs are working for the best interests of their member hospitals 

and not the dominant suppliers who fund their activities. And if 

you do so, this will ensure that patients, caregivers and the American taxpayer suffer no longer and the future is much brighter for 

the health care system. 

Thank you very much and I look forward to answering any questions you may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Leahey appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman DEWINE. Mr. Leahey, thank you very much. 

Professor, you are next. 

STATEMENT OF S. PRAKASH SETHI, PROFESSOR OF MANAGEMENT, BARUCH COLLEGE, THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW 

YORK, NEW YORK, NEW YORK 

Mr. SETHI. Thank you, sir. For the record, I don’t represent any 

industry or any interest group. I am here on my own behalf. I had 

to pay my own fare to come here. 

Chairman DEWINE. Senator Kohl wouldn’t pay for you? 

Mr. SETHI. No. I asked them, actually. They said they had no 

budget, and it embarrassed my university when I asked them for 

the money to come here. 

Anyway, I speak here only in my capacity as a university professor and president of the International Center for Corporate Accountability. This is a research organization based in the university 

and we do primarily work in the area of codes of conduct, how they 

are created, how they are managed, and essentially how they are 

implemented. I have spent a large part of my 30-year academic career on this work. 

9

Before I talk about the GPO initiative, let me briefly offer you 

an overview of industry codes and discuss briefly the methodology 

we use at the ICCA for evaluating the substance, viability and efficacy of these codes. 

Based on our research and field work in monitoring code compliance, we have identified eight conditions that must be met for an 

industry-made code to demonstrate measurable and credible compliance. Let me briefly summarize those eight points. 

One, the code must be substantive in addressing broad areas of 

public concern pertaining to the industry’s conduct. Two, code 

standards must be specific in addressing issues embodied in those 

principles. Three, the industry must create an independent governance structure that is not controlled by the executives of the member companies. And, four, there must be an independent external 

monitoring and compliance verification system, which is absolutely 

necessary to engender public trust and credibility in the industry’s 

claims for performance. 

Before addressing the GPO initiative, it is necessary to examine 

briefly the current GPO business model. Mr. Leahey mentioned 

something about that and so I do not need to repeat it. Based on 

our own analysis, it is evident that the current GPO model has 

built-in structure flaws and its financial incentives are so perverse 

that the GPO initiative cannot possibly remedy the situation. 

We cannot talk seriously about a meaningful GPO initiative until 

Congress realigns the financial incentives so that the hospitals and 

not the vendors are once again the GPOs’ only clients. As long as 

vendors continue to pay fees to the GPOs, any attempt to create, 

implement and enforce a voluntary code is doomed to failure. It 

would not improve the situation, but actually it would worsen it. 

Let me now discuss the findings of our study of the GPO initiative. Over the last 6 months, my colleagues and I at ICCA have reviewed virtually all of the public records on the GPO issue and 

have evaluated the GPO initiative against the principles referenced 

above. This is the customary process and a necessary pre-condition 

for drawing objective and unbiased conclusions. 

In my professional opinion, the six principles of the GPO initiative fail to measure up even at the very minimal level to any of 

the eight criteria we indicated. There is a total lack of independence in the initiative’s governance structure, which is entirely controlled by the top executives of the member companies. Although 

the initiative includes a coordinator, the coordinator has no real 

authority. 

The principles are essentially a statement of intent. All measures 

of substance are left entirely to the member companies. Industry 

members also set their own criteria with regard to compliance, performance evaluation, implementation assurance and public disclosure. Reduced to its bare essentials, the final product of this process becomes nothing more than a compilation of the reports provided by the member companies based on their own self-evaluation. 

The governance structure of the GPO initiative does not provide 

any mechanism for independent external monitoring and 

verification of member companies’ self-reported performance. Instead, it expects the public to accept this self-reported performance 

at face value. Such an assertion would be a dubious proposition 

10

under the best of circumstances. It would be untenable, given the 

industry’s current record. 

In summary, the GPO initiative is encumbered with a lack of 

specificity, non-existent performance standards and an internally 

controlled and self-serving governance structure, and an absence of 

genuine independent external monitoring. Furthermore, so long as 

GPOs continue to be funded by the vendors, meaningful and lasting reforms will not be possible because of the inherent conflict of 

interest that exists. 

However, once this conflict is eliminated and all parties—namely 

hospitals, the GPOs and the suppliers—are actively committed to 

the principles and implementation conditions listed above, an industry code may prove a worthwhile exercise. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Sethi appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman DEWINE. Professor, thank you very much. 

Ms. Ubbing, thanks for joining us. 

STATEMENT OF MINA UBBING, PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, FAIRFIELD MEDICAL CENTER, LANCASTER, 

OHIO 

Ms. UBBING. Thank you. I would like to thank Chairman DeWine 

and Ranking Member Kohl for inviting me to testify today. It is a 

special pleasure to be here before a fellow Ohioan, Chairman 

DeWine. I have some brief comments and would ask that my full 

written statements be put into the record. 

Chairman DEWINE. They will be made a part of the record. 

Thank you. 

Ms. UBBING. Thank you. 

I am pleased to speak about the way in which the health care 

supply chain operates, having spent 27 years in the field of health 

care finance. In 2001, I was appointed president and CEO of Fairfield Medical Center, and before that served as Fairfield’s CFO. We 

are a 222-bed hospital, not-for-profit, in a community, and we have 

become a major referral center serving the health care needs of 

southeastern Ohio. 

I bring to this hearing my perspective not only as FMC’s CEO, 

but also as Chair of a four-hospital Ohio Valley hospital consortium. I am also on the board of the Ohio Hospital Association, and 

in that sense I believe I speak for all 170 of that association’s member hospitals and health systems. 

As the members of this Subcommittee are undoubtedly aware, 

America’s health care systems are under tremendous pressure to 

deliver health care at affordable prices and to do so without undermining the financial well-being of our delivery systems. In addition 

to providing top-flight health professionals, we must maintain an 

inventory of state-of-the-art technology, as well as goods and services, enabling us to provide the highest quality of care to every surgical patient, emergency room visitor, expectant mother and every 

individual seeking medical testing. 

At Fairfield Medical Center, we purchase tens of thousands of 

goods and services, and have relationships with more than 1,600 

vendors. While ours is a strong and well-respected hospital, we are 

11

relatively small and our power in the enormous health care purchasing marketplace is modest. That is why we have long been a 

member of health care group purchasing organization, or GPO. 

For 22 years, FMC has been a proud member of Amerinet and 

we have reaped great benefits from that relationship by leveraging 

Amerinet’s market expertise and power. The hard-dollar savings to 

FMC directly attributable to participating in Amerinet are roughly 

$1.1 million per year. These savings do not reflect the many other 

values that we get from being part of Amerinet, including education, assistance in negotiating for non-Amerinet products, and 

benchmarking FMC’s performance against our peers. 

Without the contracting services we get from our GPO, FMC 

would need to add at least five new professional purchasing staff 

at annual cost of some $400,000. Without the nationwide knowledge of products and prices our GPO maintains, we would be at a 

great disadvantage in negotiating our own contracts, which would 

further erode our pricing power. 

Yet, not all our purchasing is through our GPO. To the contrary, 

only 63 percent of FMC’s purchasing occurs through Amerinet. Of 

the top 500 items we purchase, only half come from GPO contracts. 

We buy the remainder directly from vendors. GPOs do not make 

purchasing decisions for hospitals. Rather, such decisions are driven by a variety of factors, including clinician preferences, our own 

comfort level with certain products and services, and the knowledge that our purchase is cost-effective, not just low-cost. Ultimately, if we are required to have it or if our clinical staff demands 

it, we try to purchase it at the best possible price. It is as simple 

as that. 

One example of an item that our clinical staff required but we 

did not purchase through our GPO is a technology produced by a 

small Dublin, Ohio company that makes a gamma detection device 

used for cancer surgery. When we couldn’t buy this item through 

our GPO, we went directly to the manufacturer and established a 

vendor relationship. 

Sometimes, items can’t be accessed through our GPO because the 

manufacturer will not sell to a GPO. This is often the case in items 

that are patented. It may be a legitimate new innovation and we 

will have to buy directly from the vendor. 

That said, whenever we consider buying a new item, we rely on 

a wide array of resources to guide our decision, including input 

from clinicians, outside experts, manufacturers, consulting firms 

and our GPO. Fairfield Medical Center has a value analysis Committee to review all new technologies, whether they come to us at 

the request of a physician, through a trade show, or direct appeal 

from a vendor. Each prospective purchase is subjected to a 16-point 

value inspection to measure clinical benefit and cost-effectiveness. 

The technological needs of our hospital are constantly changing. 

We can count on health care consumers to demand access to the 

best new technologies, just as our clinicians demand use of the 

same. We must be able to respond to these demands and that is 

why we have a system in place at FMC to identify and evaluate 

new medical technologies and to acquire them when doing so is the 

right clinical and financial decision for our hospital. 

12

GPOs do provide immense value to FMC and other health care 

systems, even though they hardly control our purchasing decisions. 

The GPO model of charging administrative fees to suppliers and 

providing cost savings and other important benefits to FMC and its 

other members is critical for any health care system in today’s economically challenging environment. This is particularly the case for 

small and rural systems like ours which have the least market 

power and the most to lose from margin pressures. 

Over the nearly three decades I have been a hospital administrator, I have seen many unintended consequences of well-intentioned but misguided efforts to better control business practices in 

the health care sector. Where GPOs are concerned, I believe that 

any restrictive legislation would have a dangerous or ripple effect 

on America’s hospitals—adverse consequences that would be felt 

more severely by small and rural systems such as ours. 

I ask you to join me in recognizing the value GPOs bring to the 

hospital marketplace, and that, while important, these entities do 

not control the purchasing marketplace, but rather help to make it 

more robust, competitive and cost-effective in an informed environment. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Ubbing appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman DEWINE. Thank you very much. 

Senator Kohl.

Senator KOHL. Thanks a lot, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Bednar, as the industry initiative coordinator, you know that 

we have said many times that for self-regulation to work it must 

contain meaningful sanctions for non-compliance, or in other words 

it must have real teeth. As I understand the industry initiative, the 

only sanction available if a GPO fails to live up to its obligations 

is the possibility of suspension by the steering committee of the industry initiative. 

The steering committee, as you know, is made up of the CEOs 

of the GPO members of the initiative. So is the possibility of suspension really an adequate sanction to ensure compliance with the 

principles of the initiative? What would it really matter if a GPO 

was suspended from a private, voluntary organization such as this 

one? A hospital could still use the services of that GPO to buy products. So what difference would it make? 

Mr. BEDNAR. Thank you, Senator Kohl. I think that is a good 

question to ask, and the answer is that there will be enormous peer 

pressure for conformance. This industry initiative is in perfect harmony with some of the best thinking about how organizations 

should govern themselves, and I refer specifically to the organizational sentencing guidelines, chapter 8. I refer to the rules of the 

New York Stock Exchange. I refer to the regulations of a number 

of Federal agencies that are involved in acquisition. All of those believe in the principle of self-governance as the best approach to assuring compliance and the development of an ethical culture. 

Insofar as the sanctions are concerned, this initiative is not designed to tee up penalties for misconduct. It is designed to encourage ethical conduct. It is designed with the best interests of the industry involved, the health care industry. 

13

I have witnessed the commitment and the sincerity of the CEOs 

who have formed the initiative and I believe that the initiative will 

soon grow. We have already attracted four additional GPOs even 

in the short period of time that I have been the coordinator. I think 

as the industry sees and perceives and understands the value that 

this initiative adds to the health care supply chain that others will 

try to emulate it, or will certainly emulate it. 

Specifically, if a GPO does not comply with the ethical expectations to which it is committed, I think there will be enormous pressure on that particular organization to fall into line. That pressure 

will come not only from the other members of the GPO, but from 

me as well, as the person responsible for reviewing the responses. 

Also, I think it is important that all of the activities of the GPO 

are displayed for the public to see on a website. Transparency itself 

is a strong enforcement mechanism. 

Senator KOHL. Dr. Sethi, in your view, is the sanction or the suspension of the industry initiative sufficient to ensure that GPOs 

comply with the principles, or is it really much too little? 

Mr. SETHI. With all due respect, I don’t think this initiative 

amounts to much, if anything. If you look at the six principles, it 

simply says thou shall be good, thou shall not lie. But they were 

supposed to do all those things in the first place. The fact that we 

are here and the initiative is here is because we wanted to, and 

they expected us to seek improvements. 

But there is nothing in these principles or governance mechanism that provides any assurance that changes will take place. 

They are reporting what they want to report, not what we want to 

hear. There is no external monitoring mechanisms. Are they actually reporting what they are supposed to be reporting? 

In an industry setting, best practices is an oxymoron because all 

they are doing is supporting each other so that nobody gets out of 

line. Where is an idea that there is a better practice and then we 

ask the industry whether or not it is complying with it? We have 

no specifics of what ethical standards they are talking about, we 

have no specifics about what type of report they would make, and 

we have no specifics about how do we know whether or not that 

report is accurate. I rest my case. 

Senator KOHL. I will ask one more question and then we will 

turn it back to the Chairman. 

Mr. Bednar, a key part of your job will be to address GPOs’ compliance with the charter of the initiative. You will depend on information submitted to the initiative by the GPOs in response to a 

questionnaire to make the assessment. How will you verify that the 

information provided by the GPOs is accurate? Will there be any 

independent audit of the GPOs or will you rely entirely on the information that the GPOs supply to you? 

Mr. BEDNAR. Thank you, Senator Kohl. My role as the coordinator for this initiative is comparable to the role I have held with 

the defense industry initiative; that is to say I am the coordinator 

of that initiative as well. By experience, it is very easy to tell the 

sincerity and the commitment of the responses to the annual questionnaire. 

First of all, there is an instruction that the company has to be 

very detailed in preparing its responses. Second of all, the quesVerDate 0ct 09 2002 12:53 Aug 15, 2006 Jkt 028340 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\28340.TXT SJUD4 PsN: CMORC
14

tions themselves are very penetrating. Third, the responses require 

documentation and reference to organizational supporting documents, policies and practices. Fourth, the responses are displayed 

publicly for all to see on our website and for all to judge on our 

website. 

Finally, we have now planned in future best practices forums to 

invite in outsiders to participate with us in the annual best practices forums so that there will be additional witnessing of the sincerity and the commitment of this organization. 

Senator KOHL. Well, we will come back to it, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman DEWINE. Thank you, Senator Kohl. 

Ms. Ubbing, I was interested in your testimony about the fact 

that you purchase items outside the GPOs. Could you give us an 

estimate of what percentage of your purchases are outside the 

GPOs? 

Ms. UBBING. Yes. All of our purchases outside the GPOs amount 

to about 37 percent of purchases; 63 percent are within the GPO. 

Chairman DEWINE. And what would those generally be? Can you 

give us a—

Ms. UBBING. Outside the GPO? 

Chairman DEWINE. Sure. 

Ms. UBBING. It could be anything from sutures to technology. It 

could be information technology, as opposed to clinical devices. It 

could be a medication. It could be any type of purchase. 

Chairman DEWINE. And why do you purchase outside the GPOs, 

then, in each one of those cases? I mean, in general, why? 

Ms. UBBING. OK. Quite often, that is driven by clinical preference of our practitioners who are using the devices. Particularly 

with physicians, if they have been trained to use one type of a device and the GPO contract calls for another, it is their time and it 

is our risk as well as theirs for them to have to go into a procedure 

with equipment that they are not comfortable with. 

Another reason is availability of connectivity. Take IV pumps. If 

all our IV tubing has come from one company and the contract 

with the IV pumps is from another, the conversion and the cost to 

our organization would be huge to have to change things that 

aren’t broken to replace something that we want to update. 

Chairman DEWINE. Would you say that Fairfield Medical Center 

is typical in that sense? Do you think most hospitals would be 

about one-third outside? 

Ms. UBBING. I would think so, sir. I am not absolutely positive 

of that. I do not have data to support that, but certainly I know 

other hospitals go outside. And particularly your children’s hospitals and some of those hospitals would have to go outside simply 

because the products are not in the contracts. 

Chairman DEWINE. Mr. Leahey, why wouldn’t Ms. Ubbing’s testimony refute your argument? The hospitals are exercising judgment. They can go out and find other innovative products. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Again, I think if you look at the market power of 

the GPOs, $80 billion or whatever it is they bring through, they are 

the gatekeeper. And while there may be a small percentage—

Chairman DEWINE. Her testimony is they are not the gatekeeper 

for her. She would say that, look, when we see a product and our 

15

doctors say we want a product, she goes out and buys the product, 

if their internally is need for the product. 

Mr. LEAHEY. With Amerinet, I have one of their contracts in 

front of me here and they do allow a supplier to sell directly to the 

hospital, but it is interesting that Amerinet requires a waiver in 

order for this to happen. You would think that if it was really in 

the best interests of the hospital, the vendor should sell directly to 

them without needing a waiver from Amerinet. 

And again when you look at the market-leading GPOs—Novation, Premier and others—they have tremendous influence in the 

marketplace and they do not always permit other products to get 

to the market. 

Chairman DEWINE. Well, I am still trying to understand. Of 

course, this is not the first panel we have heard from and we have 

heard from other panels who have told us that—other witnesses 

have told us that innovation has been stifled and we have had 

some pretty strong testimony in this area. So this is the background, but as far as just the testimony we are hearing today, Ms. 

Ubbing is telling us that at least in her hospital she has been able 

to exercise the ability to go outside the contract. She doesn’t seem 

to be too stifled by it. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Well, again I could give you dozens, as I have for 

the staff as well—dozens of companies who are still excluded from 

the marketplace. One, in particular, here that I think is very important—this is a syringe; I don’t know if you see it. It has a needle 

at the top. When you press the plunger, the needle goes in; there 

are no needle sticks. It saves caregivers lives here. They are offering this at 10 cents a syringe to Premier hospitals. The competitive 

product is about 28 cents. This is still getting locked out of the 

market. 

And when you talk and you read about some of the company’s 

call sheets, they say that Premier didn’t let their hospitals know 

about this. And why would they, when the GPO model incentivizes 

them to do otherwise? They make more money the higher the price 

of the product. It is not in their best interest currently to allow for 

the better product at a cheaper price to enter the market. 

So I think, you know, there are real problems here that we need 

to address. And, you know, some of the issues about the cost of 

bringing new staff in—5 new staff, $400,000—we are not saying 

the GPO model needs to go away. Any efficiencies that currently 

exist in the market will still exist and the providers and suppliers 

will still enjoy those. We are simply saying modify the revenue 

stream, realign the incentives of the GPOs so that they get the best 

products at the best price for their hospitals and aren’t worried 

about policing the market for their dominant suppliers. 

Ms. UBBING. May I comment? 

Chairman DEWINE. Sure. 

Ms. UBBING. With respect to an item like Mr. Leahey has shown, 

in our organization we actually had a vendor fare to look at the different devices that would protect our health care workers from needle sticks. As a result of that, the GPO was not the gatekeeper of 

what vendors came forward for us. We make those decisions. We 

are not bound by a contract with the GPOs not to look elsewhere. 

16

Chairman DEWINE. Could one make the argument that if a hospital was not as aggressive as your hospital that it would be certainly easier to go with whatever the GPO had? 

Ms. UBBING. I don’t think so. We have got too many cost constraints and too many problems to do that. In fact, when we work 

with our GPOs, quite often we ask them to go look at different 

product brands on our behalf and we name the product brands. 

Chairman DEWINE. Ms. Ubbing, let me ask you another question. I don’t really quite understand the economics of this and 

maybe you can help me with it. You have stated that if you were 

to repeal the safe harbor and hospitals had to pay for GPOs directly, costs would go up. I don’t quite understand that. Do you 

want to explain that to me? 

Ms. UBBING. Certainly. 

Chairman DEWINE. I mean, it seems to me that a cost is a cost 

is a cost. I mean, somebody is going to pay for it. 

Ms. UBBING. And I think that exactly comes into play, but I 

think the reality is if the GPOs incur expenses, incur other activity 

opportunities that are no longer paid for by the vendors, those costs 

are going to invariably get back to the hospital. Consequently, 

those may or may not be allowable costs for us on our cost report. 

Therefore, you are going to lose reimbursement from your Medicare 

and Medicaid payers. Ultimately, we will lose in terms of items and 

services that we are allowed to get through our GPOs, particularly 

on the services side. 

Chairman DEWINE. So what you are telling me is that this is a 

Federal reimbursement issue, actually. 

Ms. UBBING. It has the potential to be. Our Federal reimbursement is capped, as you know, by the Medicare DRG system, prospective payment system. And at the same time, vendors are not 

capped from what they charge us. Certainly, we can enter into a 

GPO contract that for a period of time we will retain a price. But 

anything that is new or anything that is innovative that we want 

to go to, drug-eluding stents being a classic example of this, the 

Medicare provisions did not initially allow—when drug-eluding 

stents were finally approved, did not allow an increase in our reimbursement for the use of those, and the difference in price was significant. 

Chairman DEWINE. Mr. Leahey. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Mr. Chairman, if I may, again I think it is—

Chairman DEWINE. Let me just say we have two other witnesses 

here. Anytime you two want to jump in, don’t be bashful. You 

know, this is kind of like ‘‘Hardball.’’ The only way you are going 

to get in is just jump right in. Or ‘‘Crossfire’’ maybe is a better 

thing, so you just jump in. 

Mr. LEAHEY. This absolutely is a cost issue and a Medicare reimbursement issue. Again, I think as the HHS IG pointed out, when 

you have many hospitals not reflecting this in their cost reports, 

there is an issue here. And I think it is fantasy to think that somehow these GPO fees are free money. No supplier is going to absorb 

these costs. 

Chairman DEWINE. Well, somebody is paying for it. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Absolutely, and there is a margin that needs to be 

made. So if the companies have to pay the GPO on the top, they 

17

have to pass the costs on to ultimately the customer or the hospital, or more importantly Medicare, who pays 46 cents on every 

dollar. 

Chairman DEWINE. Ms. Ubbing, this controversy just keeps 

going on and on and on, and the critics of this system keep beating 

you all over the head with it. I mean, sometimes you just want to 

take an issue off the table. It seems to me that just paying out for 

a service is sort of the American way, isn’t it? I mean, paying directly for a service is sort of what we do everyday. If I want to buy 

something, I pay for it. This kind of back-door payment is not really the way we usually do things in this country, is it? 

Ms. UBBING. I think I would draw an analogy for you of this: If 

I have the opportunity as a hospital to buy at a Sam’s Club or 

someplace where the items have been bought in bulk and I can 

take advantage of the same pricing that a larger hospital or a larger system could also get because of the volume involved there, that 

is great. If I have to go out one-on-one and negotiate a price, and 

the price is going to be different—I know this from ongoing activities—from hospital to the next, that is putting a lot of burden on 

me and is not lowering the cost of health care. 

Chairman DEWINE. Sam’s Club does have a membership fee, I 

think. 

Senator Schumer. 

STATEMENT OF HON. CHARLES E. SCHUMER, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK 

Senator SCHUMER. Thank you, and I am sitting here and I am 

burning up. Here we have industry people who are making record 

profits. We have most of our hospitals in New York losing money. 

They try to get together and form an organization that will save 

them money and give them some bargaining power and they end 

up looking like the bad guys. This is ridiculous. 

Why would hospitals want to pay more money? They don’t. I 

know hospital executives throughout New York. Most of them are 

non-profit and they have to lay off people everyday and they have 

to cut back services everyday. One of the few things they can do, 

as Ms. Ubbing said, is band together so they might have some bargaining power because they don’t have the ability like a company 

to hire 20 salesmen and go knock on doors and sell their product. 

And we want to not let them do that? 

There may have been abuses in these GPOs, but I will tell you 

something. I sure as heck don’t want to see them eliminated, paralyzed, handcuffed so that some businesses can make even more 

money. This is getting to the point of absurdity here, to the point 

of absurdity. 

We have the same thing with hospital reimbursement rates. In 

New York, we have got 25 percent of our hospitals close to bankrupt because the insurance companies have the bargaining power, 

because there are 30 different hospitals and only 4 or 5 different 

providers and we are not getting the health care we need. 

The idea that hospitals, Mr. Leahey, would want to pay more for 

an item, unless something is crooked, makes no sense. And the 

idea that ten of them can bargain with you instead of one-on-one 

bargaining with you is a good idea, not a bad idea, and it will bring 

18

your price down on your thing from 10 cents to 8 cents. You may 

not want that, but I want that, Medicare wants that, Medicaid 

wants that, the Government wants that and the consumer wants 

that. 

So I mean I didn’t come in here intending to make such a fuss, 

but as I sit here—it is not my way, of course. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator SCHUMER. But as I sit here, you know, sometimes governments take an excess, which there was, and then they throw 

out the baby with the bath water. And for the next 10 years we 

are underwater, suffering, and that is what I fear is happening 

here. 

I have looked into this a little bit. I have seen that the GPOs are 

really now making an effort to self-police and bring down costs, and 

it is in their interests. I just spoke with the head of a—not on this 

issue, but with the head of a major New York hospital 2 hours ago, 

a huge system, and he is a decent person. I have known him for 

25 years. He is agonizing about what to cut. He is agonizing about 

who to lay off, after they have had such pride in all this. He is not 

going to play a game and pay 28 cents for an item that he can get 

for 10 cents. 

And the theory of GPOs makes sense and we ought to make sure 

that the actuality makes sense, and I think most of the time it 

does. The purchasing initiative that they have, I think, a large 

number of hospitals are participating in, and again it is just common sense. A company that makes syringes will have its only mission to sell as many syringes as it can at the best price it can. That 

is your job. But a hospital can’t equal that energy for every product 

in every area and do as good a job. So the idea of people coming 

together and saying let’s find one expert to buy syringes for all the 

hospitals in Ohio or New York or somewhere else and bring the 

price down is what makes sense. 

You know, we didn’t do that in the Medicare bill. We didn’t allow 

Medicare to bargain with the pharmaceutical industry. Guess who 

was happy? The pharmaceutical industry. Guess who lost out? A 

lady I just spoke to in Buffalo who can’t afford a cancer drug. Her 

$2,000 is up. She will never get past the donut hole because she 

won’t pay $5,000. She is in agony, she is in pain. 

Chairman DEWINE. Senator, let me—

Senator SCHUMER. I am sorry. 

Chairman DEWINE. I have an advantage over you. I can see the 

screen and I know a vote just started. That is the only advantage 

I have. 

Senator SCHUMER. I am sorry. But, anyway, I just hope we don’t 

take this too far. That is all. 

Chairman DEWINE. Well, we are not going to take it too far, and 

let me just say neither Senator Kohl—I don’t speak for Senator 

Kohl, but neither Senator Kohl nor I have any intention—no one 

is talking about doing away with these at all. You know, the question is how it is fine-tuned and how we move from here. 

Senator Kohl.

Senator KOHL. Right. We are not talking about trying to do away 

with GPOs. They are a good thing and we want to ensure that they 

operate in a most effective and fair way. I mean, that is the point. 

19

Some of our concern, Senator Schumer, is that the GPO sets up 

its organization and then hires a person whom they pay and whom 

they can fire to be the administrative executive of that organization. You know, we are here to look at things and look at the surface and look behind the surface, and finally as a result of all the 

work we have done we would like to set up something that polices 

itself, but really gets the job done effectively. 

Senator SCHUMER. Well, I am for that. 

Senator KOHL. And you don’t disagree with that. 

Senator SCHUMER. I agree with that. 

Senator KOHL. None of us disagrees with that. 

My own personal concern is not that you are not a fine person. 

That is not the issue. They hire you, they can fire you, and you are 

going to be a part-time administrator. To us, having put in all this 

work and all this time and all this effort—we don’t know anything 

about you as a person; you may be great. But in my own mind, I 

am concerned about this initiative coming to us and saying you can 

now, Congress, go away because we are setting up this organization and we are going to hire the executor and we are going to police him and then we will fire him for any reason we want. That, 

to me, doesn’t sound like the kind of oversight that we have been 

trying to organize and get settled. 

But I have said my piece and perhaps you want to talk. 

Mr. BEDNAR. Well, with all due respect, Senator—

Chairman DEWINE. OK. Now, we are going to give you 30 seconds and we are going to give Mr. Leahey 30 seconds. 

Senator SCHUMER. The Chairman just asked him to say something a few minutes ago. Now, he is. 

Chairman DEWINE. No, no, no. Here is the problem. We have a 

vote now and this is going to end, so we are going to be out of time. 

Mr. BEDNAR. We believe the initiative has picked up exactly in 

the way that this Committee had advised the industry to pick up. 

And I am only a small player in this; I am just the coordinator, 

the executive director, if you will. The real energy and the real 

commitment comes from these nine CEOs who formed this initiative and they are the ones who are responsible for setting the tone 

from the top in a way that I think will eventually prove to be very, 

very successful. Give us time to prove that to you. 

Chairman DEWINE. Mr. Leahey. 

Mr. LEAHEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Well, this is the fourth 

hearing in as many years, and again we understand there is a potential value in the GPO model. We are not against hospitals aggregating their volume. And again our members are not the J&Js, 

the Medtronics, the Guidants. They are the little guys who are innovating products at a better price. 

Aggregating volume absolutely makes sense. We are not against 

that. The problem we have here is the funding mechanism. The 

hospitals aren’t looking to contract for more expensive products either. The problem is the GPOs, who are the middlemen—there is 

the perverse incentive in place. They are the ones who are receiving more money the higher the price of the product is. So I don’t 

think this is a hospital issue. 

So long as the GPOs are funded by the vendors whose products 

they are charged with independently evaluating on a cost-plus 

20

model, this is not going to provide the Medicare system savings. I 

think that is exactly why the Department of Justice has an ongoing 

criminal investigation into these issues about Medicare fraud. 

Chairman DEWINE. We are going to submit to all of you some 

written questions. One of the written questions will be for your 

comment about all the four proposals. I wish we had the opportunity to do this in open session and listen to your comments. We 

would appreciate you all getting back to us in writing. 

Also, this Subcommittee has received letters on this issue from 

a variety of interested members of industry, including eight from 

Ohio—the Ohio Hospital Association, Mercy Children’s Hospital, 

Lima Memorial Hospital, Akron General Health System, 

MedCentral Health System, Upper Valley Medical Center, Ohio 

Children’s Hospital Association, Catholic Health Care—and several 

other letters as well. We will put all of these in the record. 

Any additional comments? My colleague from New York. 

Senator SCHUMER. I will be very quick. I heard you read a list 

of hospitals in Ohio. I have hospitals in New York. I mean, they 

are not dumb. They sort of know what they are doing and they 

know they have to lower costs. So I would need a lot of evidence 

to show that the GPO, which is sort of set up and run by the hospitals, isn’t doing what is good for the hospitals. Now, if that is the 

case, we ought to change it, no question about it. 

But it seems to me the hospitals, which are sweating every 

minute over every nickel, at least in New York, would have a pretty good idea if they are getting rooked. And they wouldn’t be so 

much for these organizations if they are as bad as some people are 

saying. 

Chairman DEWINE. Well, I would just point out to my colleague 

that because of what this Subcommittee has done, we have made 

some substantial changes. And I don’t think there are too many 

people in the room who don’t think we have made some substantial 

changes. 

Senator SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, I agree with that. 

Chairman DEWINE. We have come a long way. 

Senator SCHUMER. I just think what seems to be happening now 

with all the new awareness, the self-policing—they are much 

tougher on it—seems to be working. And I just sort of smell out 

there that at least there are some people who would want to make 

the GPOs unworkable, not on this Committee, obviously, but some 

people who would think they would do a better job without the 

GPOs bargaining with each hospital. 

Well, we want to thank all the members of the panel who have 

come in. We appreciate it very much. We know you have taken 

your time and in some cases your money to get here, and we appreciate all of you being here. Thank you very much. It has been very 

helpful. 

[Whereupon, at 3:10 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

[Questions and answers and submissions for the record follow.]

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Æ


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