Originally Published MX May/June 2005

BUSINESS NEWS

In recent years, healthcare group purchasing organizations (GPOs) have been widely accused of employing a variety of anticompetitive business practices, and have consequently found themselves on the defense against the possibility of strict federal regulation and congressional oversight of their activities. But anyone who imagines that the GPO industry is on the ropes and about to go down for the count had better take another look.

At the beginning of April, the nation's leading healthcare GPOs announced a formal program to "promote and monitor best business practices in purchasing for hospitals and other healthcare providers." Established as the Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative, the program has enrolled as participants all of the country's major GPOs, together accounting for more than 80% of the nation's healthcare purchasing volume handled by GPOs.