PURCHASING CONSORTIA DETERMINANTS IN THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PURCHASING CONSORTIA IN COUNTY REFERRAL HOSPITALS IN THE COAST REGION, KENYA

Abstract

Purchasing consortium has been used to describe a form of cooperation in a diversified view to pool resources and manage supply risk. Academics and practice are increasingly interested in purchasing consortia because they provide a broader picture of the joint effort of corporations and government agencies in sourcing. Depending on the anticipated advantages, the function of a purchasing group might be expanded more or less. It's hard to argue for the employment of a purchasing group for anything other than cost reductions, so that's where most of the attention is focused. The strategic approach of coordinating the group purchasing enables the purchasing organization of public health facilities to join forces for a collective acquisition in the view of benefiting at reduced transaction costs from greater purchasing power, and more comprehensive information. The objectives were narrowed down to the influence of supplier capacity, contract management, portfolio approach, and suppliers’ interest; all moderated by the management information system on purchasing consortium. The study was done in the County Referral Hospital in the Coast Region, Kenya. Theoretically, the study was anchored on competency theory, MacNeil Relational Theory, Contingency Theory, Network, and Stakeholder Theory. The study used the descriptive research design in undertaking this study. The study population comprised of 212 officials drawn from across the county referral hospitals in the coastal region of Kenya. The stratified random sampling technique resulted into having a total sample size of 139 units of analysis. Data was collected by use of questionnaires, analyzed, and presented scientifically in tables and graphs. Ridge regression was further used to address multicollinearity issues through shrinking the regression coefficients towards zero, mitigating the impact of high intercorrelation among predictor variables. The study findings revealed that Supplier Capacity has a significant positive influence on the purchasing consortium, Contract Management has a significant positive on the purchasing consortium, Portfolio Approach has a significant positive influence on the Purchasing Consortium, and Supplier’s Interest has a significant positive influence on the Purchasing Consortium at County Referral Hospitals in the Coast Region, Kenya. The R Square Results in the moderated relationship model of .676 in table 4.18 indicated that over 67% of the variability of the dependent variable could be explained by the independent variables in the moderated relationship model. The standard deviation statistics value of 0.98502 which was less than the mean value indicated that the data for the management information system moderating variable was well distributed around the central tendency. The study recommends an in-depth assessment and categorization of the Procurement Needs by the County Referral Hospitals. The study recommended further research to be done on other Counties using different elements of the purchasing consortium. The thesis further recommends the use of different variables for studying purchasing consortium.