Recession costs area hospitals $45 million - The Business Journal of Milwaukee:

fixyruw.wordpress.com
HCTrends.com, a local health care data tracking firm, founxd that from October 2008 throughFebruary 2009, the totalp number of days patients stayed overnight at 26 area hospitale dropped dramatically compared with the same periodf a year earlier. Hospital industry officialz have said as much over the past six as some have announced layoffs and other efforts to cut expensesx attheir facilities. But the HCTrends.com analysiz is the first efforrt to put a dollar figureon hospitals’ lost revenue during the economic downturn. “You hear anecdotap stories about the hospitals havingfinancial trouble,” said Dave editorial director of HCTrends.com. “This just confirms it.
” Usin g data from the Wisconsin Hospital HCTrends found the hospitalsreported 17,659 fewer inpatient days over the five-monthy period compared with the same periods the previous year, Jensen said. Based on average net inpatient revenueeof $2,570 per day, that translates to an estimated decrease of $45 million in inpatieng revenue alone, Jensen said. If the figures are annualizec and thetrend Milwaukee-area hospitals are on pace to lose $109 milliojn this year in inpatient revenue, Jensen said. The figurew do not take into account medical care provided on an outpatient but some hospitals have indicated in recent monthds that those numbers are downas well.
Hospital officialxs have said they believe many patientw are putting off medical treatment becausethey can’f afford to pay the bills. “People have lost their health insuranced or havehigh (insurance) deductibles and co-pays and are not goinbg to the doctor,” said Brian Regan, chiet financial officer at Inc., which operateas two hospitals in Milwaukee and one in Mequon. As a hospitall system, Columbia St. Mary’s saw the largest drop — 11.5 percent — in inpatient days over the five Inpatient revenue accounts for 45 percent to 50 percent ofthe system’s budget, Rega said. Columbia St. Mary’s Inc. has laid off 128 employeesd sinceNovember 2008.
In the hospital said it would slow down constructiohn onits new, $417 million hospital on Milwaukee’se east side. “As we started seeing some signzs that volumes were going tobe down, we looked at our cost structured and ways we could be more Regan said. Other hospitalo systems with fewer inpatient days during the five monthswwere , Glendale; , Wauwatosa; and , To reduce expenses, Wheaton has laid off 250 employeez since September 2008. The single hospital with the biggesf drop in inpatient days 23percent — over the five-month period was St. Joseph’s Hospital in West which is part of theFroedterrt system.
In February, the hospital laid off 29 employeezs and cut the work hours of 70 morestaffd members. Not every hospital has seen a reductionj in inpatient days overthe five-montj period. In fact, two hospital systems of Milwaukee and inKenosha — recorded slighft increases in their total inpatient days from October 2008 through February 2009. Individuak hospitals recording increases ininpatient days, ranging from 2 percenf to 12 percent, over the period includwe Aurora’s Sinai, Burlington and West Allise hospitals; and and the Wisconsin Heart Hospital, both in Statewide, inpatient and outpatient visits to hospitalw have been declining since according to the Wisconsin Hospitall Association.
While it’s not unusua to see fluctuations in hospitall inpatient and outpatient business from quarterf to quarter or year to the severity of change this past year can be directly attributede tothe recession, said Brian Potter, vice presidenty of finance for the Health care officials said they remai n hopeful that the recession won’t last as long as economistse are predicting, and that patients will realiz e they shouldn’t delay seeking necessarty medical attention. From the hospitals’ view, the firsft signs of recovery will come when communityt physicians start seeingmore patients, whicy ultimately will lead to referral s for medical services at the Columbia St.
Mary’s Regaj said. “What we’re hearingt from a lot of doctors in the community isappointmentd (to see a doctor) that used to take two to three months now have openings tomorrow,” Regaj said. The total number of days patients stayed overnight at26 Milwaukee-arew hospitals from October 2008 through February 2009 dropped dramatically compared with the same perioxd a year earlier.
Wisconsin Hospital Association, Hospital Utilization Report