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you to provide?
Medicaid is another program draining dollars from your hospital. On the average, hospitals in Virginia are paid only 73 cents for every dollar it costs them to care for a Medicaid patient. In 1987, this Medicaid cost shortfall was approximately $26 million and is expected to double by 1990.
Add another $222 million of free care provided to patients who are covered by no type of medical insurance and you are looking at losses that slide hospitals into a troubling, financial sinkhole that is growing larger every day.
How will these hospital financial problems affect you? A financially healthy hospital is needed so dollars are available to update their equipment and facility, increase the salaries of their workers, offer new services and, at minimum, keep up with inflation.
As the dollar base for hospitals shrinks, the ultimate effect will be one that threatens the very purpose of hospitals’ existence: The provision of quality health care for all Virginians. What would your community be like without a hospital close by?
When you consider the impact your hospital has on your community as a major employer, a good neighbor, a key ingredient to the quality of life of the residents, you realize everyone has a stake in the issue of the financial health of their hospital.
LAURENS SARTORIS
President,
Va. Hospital Assn.
82.2%