Reducing orthopedic implant costs. A physician-driven approach at Mt. Sinai Medical Center, Cleveland.

Faced with the closing of its service, the Orthopaedics Department at Mt. Sinai Medical Center, working with Materials Management, began a program to become profitable. Through standardization, appropriate utilization, pre-planning of cases and the development of critical pathways, the service has realized about 40% savings in materials and dropped their average product costs to $2,700 per joint and reduced length of stay by five to six days. The keys have been physician input from the start, teamwork and continuous training.