Strategies employed by HMOs to achieve hospital discounts: a case study of seven HMOs.

This article is a summary of seven health maintenance organization (HMO) case studies focusing on strategies used to obtain favorable prices for inpatient hospital services. All of the HMOs stressed that the effort should be based on the local environment and should accommodate the special circumstances of organization of physicians' practices and hospitals, as well as the structure of the HMO and its strategic plan for growth.