Dive Brief:
- Operating income of $526 million in 2015 reported by the Mayo Clinic was nearly a 37% dip from the previous year, Becker's Hospital Review reports.
- Although revenue jumped 5.7% to $10.3 billion, a 9.7% increase in expenses - with higher salary and benefits costs - offset the gains.
- There was also a slight drop in admissions, but outpatient visits rose 2.6% in 2015 compared to the previous year. There were more Medicare and Medicaid patients, and fewer self-pay patients in 2015 compared to 2014.
Dive Insight:
The Mayo Clinic, Minnesota's largest employer, pointed to higher labor costs cutting into income last year, as well as increased pension costs. More staff was necessary to implement new information technology projects and a new radiation treatment center in Rochester, according to the StarTribune.
The organization added more than 4,000 employees for a total of 64,033 at its six-state hospital and clinic network.
"We did not plan to have another record year," Pat McCarty, vice president of financial planning and analysis for the Mayo Clinic, told the StarTribune. "We're in more of an investment mode now...We're growing some of our staff to support those new investments."
The growth in Medicaid patients this past year may be from the state's expanded Medicaid program, and the increase in Medicare patients was due to baby boomers getting older, McCarty said.