HCA, Inc. is the leading provider of healthcare services in the U.S. With 190 hospitals and 91 outpatient surgical centers in 23 U.S. states, England and Switzerland, HCA had revenues of $23.5 billion in 2004. To maintain its competitive position and grow its bottom line, HCA needed to create an infrastructure for integrated data management.

Many business units were operating single-focus data marts on a wide variety of platforms, but the physician services group had no such resource. Consequently, sharing and blending data was complicated and time-consuming. The healthcare provider knew it needed to move to a centralized enterprise data warehouse to include patient financials, supply chain and financial reporting data. To enhance its business intelligence capabilities, HCA also added a new tier of analytical and reporting tools.

The results have been impressive. Using insight gleaned from analysis of data consolidated from all 300 facilities, the company has -

• Lowered pharmaceutical purchasing costs by a projected $15 million annually
• Reduced medical supply procurement costs by $3-4 million annually
• Reduced inventory by nearly $3 million in 2003, with anticipated overall reductions of 20-30%

Within recent months, HCA has -

• Shortened monthly revenue reporting cycles by 75 percent, from four days to just one
• Decreased the number of financial analysts dedicated to monthly closing from eight to two
• Reduced the number of analysts dedicated to quarterly closing from 12 to four
• Gained the ability to analyze, understand and respond effectively to complex market developments

With its expanded data warehouse, managers can quickly access and analyze data on an enterprise-wide basis. The impacts of this capability include a significant impact to the bottom line and a greater ability to understand and respond to the fast-changing healthcare business environment.