As Healthcare Paradigm Shifts, NJ Hospitals Face Uncertain Future
New Jersey hospitals are in a bind. Some of them may close in the next few years, experts say, unless they find a way to transform themselves into healthcare systems that focus on keeping patients healthy in an outpatient setting, while dealing with the reality that most revenue is still based on in-hospital services they provide.
Hospitals must have cash reserves and an operating margin of at least 3 percent or they may face a financial crisis, according to current and recent hospital executives.
“If you’re not in a system that has that financial foundation, I don’t know how you manage the next three to five years,” said Judith Persichilli, recently retired president of Catholic Health East-Trinity Health, a national hospital system.
The hospitals that survive this transition period will look very different from the hospitals of the recent past. They will have fewer beds, more links with primary-care and medical specialty providers, and more partnerships with other hospitals in which each hospital only provides specific services.
That was the verdict of a panel assembled yesterday by the New Jersey Health Care Quality Institute in Ewing. (Kitchenman/NJSpotlight)