Becker's ASC Review

44 HEALTHCARE NEWS 44 Beth Israel Lahey Health CFO on the need to re- engineer healthcare By Madeline Ashley F rom supply chain disruptions and market volatility to inflationary pressures and skyrocketing labor costs, Cambridge, Mass.- based Beth Israel Lahey Health CFO Cindy Rios feels there's an industrywide need to re-engineer healthcare. "We [the healthcare industry] have been focused on doing what we've always done, better, and slightly refining it," Ms. Rios told Becker's. "I think it's incredibly obvious that's not going to be enough going forward." To combat these industry challenges and achieve success, Beth Israel Lahey has shied toward implementing the right infrastructure. ese improvements have enabled the health system, which was founded in 2019 through a merger between Boston-based Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Burlington, Mass.-based Lahey Health, cut its operating losses in the second quarter of 2024 by around $8.7 million from the same quarter last year. Over the last few years, Beth Israel Lahey has implemented a new budget system, a decision-support system and an enterprise resource-planning system. Beth Israel Lahey also recently implemented the first phase of Epic's electronic medical record system, with Phase 2 coming in October and the last phase in the next fiscal year. "e focus, once we implement this infrastructure, is then to take that and push the needle further on ChatGPT, AI," Ms. Rios said. "For the revenue cycle specifically, we want to get to the point where we're leveraging bots. We need to first implement the infrastructure and give ourselves a solution that we leverage across the system so that we can then build that next level. We can't take off until the basic platforms are in place." Beth Israel Lahey also stresses recruitment and retention of top talent both within and outside the market, which saved the health system about 50% on contract labor spending compared with last year. "We've been incredibly focused on making sure that we address initiatives that will allow us to both optimize our revenue [and] reduce our overall expense structure," Ms. Rios said. As a female health system CFO in a role that is historically male led, Ms. Rios also touched on the opportunity to challenge where the healthcare industry stands when it comes to leadership, diversity, and gender. "Simply being in the room challenges the status quo, because it's not common to have a female," she said. "As a leader myself, I look to challenge the status quo. My presence alone does that." She also shared some advice for women interested in becoming a hospital or health system CFO. "ere's significant opportunity," she said. "It is challenging, but I would say, embrace the challenge, embrace the fact that, again, our presence alone challenges the status quo. ere is a need to be much more progressive and to put out a different perspective about how we should be addressing things. Embrace that." n CHS' nurse retention rate at 'highest level in a decade,' says CEO By Alan Condon F ranklin, Tenn.-based Community Health Systems has hired almost 3,000 registered nurses during the first half of 2024 and its nurse retention rate is "very strong at its highest level in a decade," CEO Tim Hingtgen said July 25 during the company's second-quarter earnings call. In 2023, CHS added more than 1,000 bedside nurses as part of its centralized clinical recruitment program, which has expanded to include allied health positions in areas including imaging, pharmacy, lab, respiratory and surgical services. "Across these positions, hiring is up by more than 14% year-over-year," Mr. Hingtgen said. "Other facets of cost management have been an area of strength this year with contract labor, supplies and other expenses trending down in the second quarter. Innovative solutions to improve care delivery in our business operations are another area of specific focus." The 71-hospital system is also focused on graduating and recruiting nurses through its education partnership, which is expected to graduate 1,000 new nurses a year. CHS' contract labor costs were down about $3 million sequentially to $45 million and down $29 million (39%) from $74 million in the second quarter of 2023. "This decrease in contract labor was slightly better than our expectation of contract labor remaining at approximately $50 million per quarter for the year," CFO Kevin Hammons said. "We are pleased with the continued progress that reflects our recruitment and retention efforts along with lower hourly rates for contracted nurses." CHS reported a $13 million net loss in the second quarter, compared to a $38 million net loss during the second quarter of last year. n

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