Grinnell Regional Medical Center provided $8,515,639 in community benefits to Poweshiek County and surrounding service area, according to a recently completed assessment of those programs and services. That amount, based on 2009 figures, includes community health improvement services, subsidized health services, in-kind gifts, traditional charity care, government sponsored health care, bad debt, and unpaid costs for Medicaid and Medicare. GRMC reported $1.3 million in subsided health services and $497,574 in charity care that GRMC specifically implemented to help area residents.
Community benefits are activities designed to improve health status and increase access to health care. Along with uncompensated care (which includes both charity care and bad debt), community benefits include such services and programs such as the Community Care Clinic, Stork’s Nest, health screenings, health education programs, counseling, immunizations, nutritional services, and emergency and trauma services.
The results for GRMC are included in a statewide report by the Iowa Hospital Association that shows Iowa hospitals provided community benefits in 2009 valued at more than $1.2 billion. All 118 of Iowa’s community hospitals participated in the survey.
“GRMC reaches out to help so many residents,” explains Jack Fritts, GRMC chief financial officer and vice-president. “The hospital subsidized the H1N1 immunization clinics last year that helped protect residents from the flu. We also supported our outreach clinics that allow residents convenient access to healthcare services.”
“The programs and services accounted for in the survey were implemented in direct response to the needs of individual communities, as well as entire counties and regions. Many of these programs and services simply would not exist without hospital support and leadership,” said IHA president Kirk Norris.
But the ability of Iowa hospitals to respond to such needs is being hindered by the current economic downturn, as well as by losses caused by Medicare and Medicaid.
Total uncompensated care in 2009 in Iowa, including charity care and bad debt, was valued at more than $796.4 million, an increase of $85.9 million (12 percent) over 2008.
GRMC has weathered poor reimbursement from Medicare and Medicaid for many years. Fortunately, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 brings a long awaited fix to create a special payment category for tweener hospitals like GRMC.
Though we recorded a record total for unpaid cost of Medicare and Medicaid of $4.8 million in 2009, a higher level of reimbursement will begin in October 2010 to begin to bring reimbursement closer to cost.
Federal health care reform legislation passed earlier this year moved Medicare several steps toward a payment system that recognizes and rewards high-quality, low-cost providers like Iowa hospitals. Studies have shown that as much as 30 percent of health care is wasted by either being duplicative or ineffective and that some states, including Iowa, do a much better job of providing efficient care. Reducing that waste would save billions of dollars, which could be directed toward providing coverage for the uninsured.
GRMC is a not for profit community hospital. It does not receive funds from taxes but counts on revenues from services provided and donations from the community to sustain itself.
“The recent additions of physicians and surgeons as well as a better reimbursement rate for Medicare and Medicaid and continued strong financial support from individuals in our service area allow GRMC to be poised for the future. We are an integral part of the community and giving back to the people we serve is key to our future,” Fritts says.
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