LOVELOCK - The Nevada Department of Taxation wants the community to think of Pershing General Hospital as a patient with a broken leg.
Sure, it's hurting financially. But you don't need to put it out of its misery by shooting it, said Terry Rubald, who heads the department's Division of Assessment Standards.
"It's still there. It's still available 24/7," she told audience members during a Sept. 19 meeting in Lovelock. "It's still viable - still providing services - and the community needs to know that."
However, every rumor to the contrary that circulates across town has the potential to hurt the hospital's chances of making a full recovery.
"We hear: 'the hospital is closing; the hospital's closing tomorrow; the hospital's closing on weekends,' and all of these other things," said Nevada Rural Hospital Partners Chief Financial Officer Steve Boline. "We wanted to be very clear that this hospital is struggling right now, but we believe (a financial recovery) is something that is achievable."
If it's going to get better, though, it needs more patients.
PGH Trustee Carolyn Hultgren believes that residents who currently travel to facilities in other communities for treatment could help if they came to their hometown hospital first.
Obviously, some factors that influence the monthly volume of patient visits are beyond the hospital's control.
For one thing, fewer people tend to fall ill during the summer months, and the community seemed to be healthier than usual this past July - one of the hospital's lowest service months to date.
While that's great news for Lovelock's residents, it did end up hurting the hospital's bottom line. According to Boline, PGH's losses for the month outstripped its profits by just under $30,000.
There are ways to make up for that lost revenue, though.
Hospital board trustees routinely write off some bills as "uncollectible." Yet if just 1.4 percent of that past due amount had been collected, Rubald says that PGH would be in a positive financial situation today.
The board moved earlier this year to improve that billing and collections process. Yet some employees who were responsible for implementing the changes were reluctant to do so, according to the hospital's financial advisors.
However, Nevada Rural Hospital Partners President Joan Hall told the audience that the board and PGH CEO/ Administrator Patty Goldsworthy have taken the issue very seriously, as evidenced by the recent changeover in staff.
The hospital has also cut its operational costs, making significant reductions in staffing and employee pay, while divesting itself of its retail pharmacy. In addition, the board adopted its advisors' recommendations to fill beds at the nursing home.
At the same time, the hospital is actively trying to recruit new physicians, who could bring in additional revenue.
That task is not without its challenges, though.
Hall noted that some physicians might not feel welcome in the community, while others may have spouses who would not even consider living in a place that doesn't have a Macy's department store. Still others believe that they can make more money at bigger hospitals in larger communities, she said.
"A doctor isn't going to be able to make a half a million dollars in Lovelock," she noted.
However, the hospital might have better luck recruiting physicians who are in the U.S. on medical visas.
On average, those doctors will stick around for three to five years, by which time they've fulfilled the terms of their visas.
As for the doctors who are already here - or those who recently left the hospital - one audience member questioned why they were sending him out of town for "silly little tests."
PGH Director of Clinical Services Deanna Davis said the hospital no longer has the volume of patients it needs to support some physicians who specialize in a particular field of medicine.
Out-of-town specialists will not drive to Lovelock to see one patient - or even five patients. But they might be willing to make the trip if they could schedule 10 or more appointments, Hall said.
Ultimately, that underscores the main point that Hall and others tried to convey to the audience: if it's going to rebound and build on its current level of care, the hospital needs more patients.
- Second of two articles. For additional coverage, see the Sept. 22-28 edition of the Lovelock Review-Miner.
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