The average payment for a three-day inpatient stay is in the $6,000 to $8,000 range, while the hospitals receive $1,500 to $2,000 for shorter stays that last 18 to 23 hours, Scullin said.
“Twenty-five percent of our business went in that direction over the last 18 months,” toward the shorter, less lucrative stays, Scullin said.
The change is evident in Crozer’s financial disclosures to bond investors. In the six months ended Dec. 31, Crozer’s acute inpatient admissions declined 7.7 percent, to 17,263 from 18,700 in the comparable period the year before. Observations, meanwhile, nearly doubled, to 3,871 from 1,989. That was 80 percent higher than budgeted by management.
The trend was cited this week as a reason for Moody’s decision to put a negative outlook on Crozer’s credit rating for $153.2 million of debt.
Scullin said Crozer, which has had an operating loss in three of the last five years, has been working hard to cut costs for the last 18 months. That shows in the health system’s financial results. The system’s total profit margin improved to 2 percent for the six-month period, up from 1.1 percent the year before. Crozer’s revenue for the period was about flat at $362 million.
Bill Cruice, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals, which represents 700 nurses and 60 paramedics at Crozer-Chester Medical Center, called the layoff announcement “disconcerting,” given the fact that Crozer’s “margins are actually much better than they have been for a while.”
In addition to Crozer-Chester Medical Center in Upland, Crozer owns Delaware County Memorial Hospital in Drexel Hill, Springfield Hospital in Springfield, Taylor Hospital in Ridley Park, and Community Hospital, a behavioral-health facility in Chester.
Contact Harold Brubaker at 215-854-4651 or hbrubaker@phillynews.com.
