Community posts $9 million bottom line
Community Medical Centers ended its fiscal year Aug. 31 with a $9 million positive bottom line, according to pre-audit figures released by the nonprofit hospital system this week. It is the first time in four years that Community has ended its fiscal year in the black.
Total expenses for Community – the San Joaquin Valley's largest medical provider – were $826 million. Nearly half of those expenses, about $408 million, were for salaries and benefits. Community also reinvested more than $50 million in facilities and equipment, much of it related to the April 
transition of acute-care services from University Medical Center to the Community Regional Medical Center campus.
Though the numbers are pre-audit, hospital officials say they're not likely to change in the final audit report that's expected in a few weeks.
“The positive bottom line represents a financial turnaround in progress, and that's very good and important news,” said John Zelezny, Community’s senior vice president for communications. “But there's still more work ahead to ensure a thriving hospital system for the future.”
Zelezny said Community was able to improve finances by cutting expenses, expanding specialty services, and renegotiating insurance reimbursement contracts.
Community – which operates Community Regional Medical Center, Clovis Community Medical Center, Fresno Heart & Surgical Hospital and other health care facilities – also is the region's key “safety net” provider for the medically underserved. For 2006-07 Community will report to the state about $122 million in “community benefits” – a figure that represents the system's actual cost of charity services and other uncompensated medical care.
In comparison, Zelezny said, the most recent figures from the state indicate that all other nonprofit hospitals in the Fresno area combined – including St. Agnes Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, Children’s Hospital Central California and Madera Community Hospital – reported about $70 million in community benefits.
Continuing positive bottom lines are important, Zelezny said, because Community needs to continue growing with the region, investing in the latest medical technologies, and investing in its staff.
Community Regional is finishing construction on a 52-bed neuroscience unit dedicated to spine and brain patients, with a dedicated stroke unit. Completion of a new lab is expected next month. And construction is slated to begin soon on Terry’s House, a 17,000-square-foot, hotel-like facility to provide affordable lodging for families of burn and trauma survivors while their loved ones are recovering.
Fresno Heart & Surgical, in the year ahead, will add two advanced-technology, minimally-invasive operating suites, a 144-seat education center and more beds to the surgery recovery area. At Clovis Community, plans are under way to add a 22,000-square-foot, two-story outpatient surgery expansion to the west of the existing hospital.
This story was reported by Eddie Hughes. He can be reached at eddieh@communitymedical.org.