HM’s Role in Helping Hospitals Profit
A new report shows that 1 in 5 community hospitals operates in the red, but the chief strategy officer of the firm that conducted the survey thinks hospitals can help change that.
The second annual survey from healthcare information technology (HIT) provider Anthelio and leadership group Community Hospital 100 found that 22% of community hospitals operate with margins below 2%; another 38% operate below 1%. Rick Kneipper, Anthelio’s cofounder and chief strategy officer, says that hospitalists can be at the forefront “of the creative changes needed” to reduce costs and improve profitability.
“Hospital medicine groups and hospitals could free up significant funds to devote to improved patient-care services if they focus on their core competency of patient care and farm out their non-core, back-office services to experts who can use leverage to provide more efficient services at significantly reduced costs,” Kneipper wrote in an email to The Hospitalist. “Financial pressures have historically forced most industries to stop trying to be vertically integrated [trying to be ‘all things to all people’] and instead to focus on their core competencies—it’s time for healthcare to do the same.”
—Rick Kneipper, cofounder, chief strategy officer, Anthelio
HM’s foothold at the intersection of clinical care and safety and QI positions the specialty to “respond to the new challenges of readmission penalties, evidenced-based medicine requirements, EMR implementation, and operation challenges,” Kneipper wrote.
For the full survey, please visit www.antheliohealth.com and search “survey.”
