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Critical Condition
Hospitals Challenged by Rising Costs, Falling Revenues
BY GEORGE O’BRIEN
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continue to rise.
Hospitals have perpetually struggled from a fiscal stand-
point amid continually rising prices, the need to constantly upgrade technology and innovate, and reimbursement rates from payers that have historically been below 80 cents on
the dollar, Roose said. But trends and conditions that existed before the pandemic have only been exacerbated over the past three years, and now, hospitals are at a critical, and extremely challenging, crossroads.
“There’s no way to sugarcoat it — hospitals and health sys- tems across Massachusetts, and across the majority of the
country, are finding themselves struggling in many regards, and at an inflection point where there are going to need to be continued efforts to support hospitals, or there will continue to be systems and hospitals that remain in distress,” said Roose, chief administrative officer at Mercy Medical Center in Spring- field, part of Trinity Health Of New England.
He quantified the situation by noting that Mercy is on a path to lose roughly $25 million for the fiscal year that will end in June, about the same amount as last year.
“It will be challenging to persist with the current models that are in place in the same ways that we have in the past,” Roose went on. There are a multitude of reasons for that, but the challenges remain significant, and the pathways forward are going to require multiple initiatives and ongoing support from a variety of different angles.
Dr. Lynette Watkins, president and CEO of Cooley Dickin- son Hospital, an affiliate of Mass General Brigham, agreed, noting that COVID put the challenges that all hospitals are fac- ing under a brighter spotlight.
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n “inflection point.”
That’s what Dr. Robert Roose says hospitals
have reached when it comes to their bottom lines and the ongoing challenge of making ends meet at a time when revenues continue to fall and expenses