Dive Brief:
- In its third-quarter results released Monday, Catholic Health Initiatives revealed an operating loss of $66.7 million on $3.9 billion in operating revenue.
- Two recent hospital acquisitions (Sylvania Franciscan Health based in Toledo, Ohio and St. Alexius Medical Center in Bismarck, ND) continue to operate at a deficit and push up operating expenses.
- To combat rising expenses, the company plans to slim down its corporate office staff and sell unprofitable St. Joseph Health in Reading, PA, to Penn State Health.
Dive Insight:
Modern Healthcare aptly called these figures the "growing pains" of CHI's wholesale bet on consolidation, but that word choice suggests guaranteed success. The company has jumped feet-first into the approach that "bigger is better" in today's market, but as Navigant's Bruce Henderson told the publication, there is always "execution risk."
"It's not just the size, it's what you do with the size when you've gained that scale," Henderson said.
It wasn't all bad news for CHI. The operator did report gains from healthcare reform in a number of states—the Pacific Northwest region, Arkansas and Ohio specifically. Medicaid expansion in Kentucky has also given the company a boost in that state.
Still, patient volumes weren't great. The company reported an almost 3% decline in both admissions and inpatient surgeries. Outpatient visits increased 3.7%, but outpatient surgeries were down 4.2%.