Premier Gets Possibly Conflicted Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award
On November 21st, Premier, Inc. was one of the three recipients of the 2006 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. The award was established by Congress in 1987 “to promote quality awareness, to recognize quality and business achievements of U.S. organizations, and to publicize these organizations’ successful performance strategies” and named after the Secretary of Commerce between 1981 and 1987. It’s managed for the Commerce Department by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a non-regulatory agency.
USA Today reports some medical manufacturers see this as an obvious conflict of interest, given the fact Richard Norling, Premier’s President and CEO, is also a director of the Award Foundation. According to USA Today, a Premier spokesman said Norling offered to resign from his board seat at the foundation when he learnt his company was nominated, but he was told that wasn’t necessary since as a board director he had no say in who would get the award. The panel of judges for 2006 included people from several healthcare organizations including Kaiser Permanente and Mayo Clinic.
November 29, 2006 Related topics: Ethics & Scandals, Group purchasing & GPOs