WINNSBORO – Most of the hour-long meeting last week of the Fairfield Memorial Hospital Board was spent pouring over the hospital’s financials.
According to a slimmed down six-page ‘service line’ report presented by FMH Chief Finance Officer Timothy Mitchell, for both the month of February and the hospital’s fiscal year to date (October 1 through February 28), the biggest revenue producers for the hospital were the emergency room, imaging services (X-rays, CT scans, etc.) and laboratory services. Although revenues were down compared to the same period last year, the hospital’s expenses were likewise lower.
Also, while Mitchell reported an operating loss of $107, 507 in February, for fiscal year to date the hospital showed an EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation & Amortization) of $194,321. Board trustee Randy Bright pointed out that this was a significant “swing” compared to $966,000 in losses sustained by the hospital over the same period last year.
One possible factor underlying the hospital’s financials has been the steady decline in the number of patients seen in the emergency department. Tiana Walters-Mitchell, Chief Nursing Officer, provided the Board with an “ER Patient Census” report. In fiscal year 2013 the ER department was seeing about 30 patients a day, she said. This decreased to an average of 22 patients a day last year. The hospital set a goal to see at least 23 patients a day in the emergency room for 2017; the average per day in February was 22 and, in March, the number of patients going to the ER has exceeded that goal.
Suzanne Doscher, CEO, also reported on her concerns with the inpatient census.
“It has been pretty low lately, less than two patients per day. So we have started discussions on how to handle things if we don’t have any inpatients…” Doscher said the administration and staff have been looking at how to manage the nursing staff who are normally on duty on the hospital floor, and have also talked with the ER physicians. Dr. Roger Gaddy, FMH Chief of Staff, noted that the ER docs had expressed some concerns about whether more patients could be admitted thru the ER and not be so quickly sent on to hospitals in Columbia.
The Board also unanimously approved two motions from its finance and audit committee: to accept the fiscal year 2015 financial audit, and to award the 2016 audit work to the incumbent audit firm of CliftonLarsonAllen, which had the low bid of $34,500 in response to a request for proposals for the work. DHG Healthcare out of Greenville, SC, the only other firm responding to the request for proposals for the annual audit work, submitted a bid of $40,000-$45,000.
