Virtualstock chosen by Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
The Edge for Health platform provides eProcurement functionality
Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (STH) is the latest healthcare organisation to adopt an innovative technology platform from Virtualstock.
Andrea Smith, director of procurement at the trust, explains: “With the NHS procurement landscape changing significantly we needed to implement a truly-Innovative solution and Virtualstock was the obvious choice.
“Highlighted as an example of best practice by Lord Carter, the STH team was keen to adopt The Edge for Health platform.
“We are currently working with our suppliers to ensure the product catalogue is enriched and price files authorised. That process will inevitably lead to more-accurate orders and less invoice queries. It is also a great way for us to see the vast product ranges that historically we did not have room to store on our legacy system.
“It is a true marketplace for sourcing and product innovation.”
Importantly for the supplier community, the platform enables preparation of data ready for the required submission to the GDSN data pool.
Working with GS1, Virtualstock ensured all required attributes were embedded into the catalogue platform and can be easily matched and compliance tracked. Alternatively, Virtualstock can work with suppliers to pull data in from the GDSN data pool. All of this is available to the supplier community at no cost.
Several notable hospitals are already using the system. The Shelford Group, a collection of trusts comprised of England’s leading NHS multi-specialty academic healthcare organisations, is in the middle of its roll-out programme as well as the strategic partnership with Shared Business Services and its 68 member trusts.
The adoption of this disruptive technology is testament to the increasing appetite for change, with the NHS eager to learn from other industries regarding how technology can transform supply chains.
Virtualstock is bringing retail best practice eCommerce at pace and scale into the NHS. The Edge provides a comprehensive, online, end-to-end ‘PIM2Pay’ platform delivering a solution that spans the entire product lifecycle – from product information management (PIM) to payment (eInvoice).
The platform is designed to meet exacting retail & GS1 eCommerce standards, including a consumer-style experience to accelerate the pace of adoption.
Built upon agile, disruptive, cloud-based technology, its ‘responsive design’ enables full functionality to be delivered online, to a device and to mobile, supporting and improving productivity at the frontline of the NHS for both trusts and suppliers.