The economic impact of the pandemic has been hardest on hospitals in rural and underserved communities, many of which were already struggling to remain viable due to pre-pandemic financial strain.

Organizations on the brink

Mercy Hospital, the oldest in Chicago, announced this week that it has filed for bankruptcy. Mercy is a safety net hospital, and its closure will leave patients vulnerable in the city’s underserved South Side. The hospital said in a statement: “Mercy tried for many years to find a path to financial sustainability. This included a multi-year national search for buyers and a robust transformation plan with other safety net hospitals. Unfortunately, neither path provided a viable future."

In Connecticut, UConn Health continues to plea for financial aid from the state, recently receiving only half of what they requested to help them through the pandemic. Governor Ned Lamont’s budget stressed the gravity of the situation: “The UConn Health Center is in desperate need of additional state support. As the top-flight medical center faces growing costs that outpace its clinical revenue growth, the state budget must ensure that John Dempsey Hospital can continue to carry out its academic, clinical, and research missions.”

Avoiding a similar fate

Dire situations like these threaten access to care and can have real implications on public health. There are many factors that impact financial stability in the healthcare industry, and many of them are outside of organizations’ control, but it’s never been more important for struggling hospitals and health systems to reevaluate their financial programs with sustainability in mind. 

Our team can help in one area: the sustainable design of compensation and benefit programs for your physicians and executive team.

The Call Pay Solution

We designed our Call Pay Solution to help healthcare organizations with a widespread problem: The physician shortage has increased competition among hospitals for physicians. As a result, competitive compensation packages and call pay programs are a must, even though the expense is a hefty one, especially for smaller health systems and care providers. 

MaxWoth’s Call Pay Solution provides a creative approach to addressing the issue of call pay that’s both attractive to physicians and financially sustainable in the long term.

Maury Regional Health CEO Alan Watson says that the program, “allowed us to do something to acknowledge the difficult hours the physicians put into taking call without harming our bottom-line in a significant way. The physicians are more satisfied. They feel like we’re acknowledging their contributions for call, and it was a partnership process, not top-down.”

Cost recovery

Many would be satisfied if they could simply contain the cost of call pay. But the Call Pay Solution helps our clients go beyond cost containment and actually recoup a portion of their call pay expense by utilizing common benefit funding methods. This provides a boost to the hospital’s bottom line, which can be extremely valuable in times of unprecedented financial strain. 

Learn more

To learn more about how our Call Pay Solution can help you maintain your financial stability, download a copy of our white paper or schedule a call with one of our plan consultants.