March 16, 2016 — In 2014, Southeast Georgia Health System hospitals
in Glynn and Camden counties generated more than$574,346,000 in revenue for the local and state economy, according to a recent report
by the Georgia Hospital Association, the state’s largest hospital
trade association. The report also found that, during the same time period,
Southeast Georgia Health System hospitals provided approximately $30,619,000
in uncompensated care while sustaining more than 1,800 full-time jobs
(this number does not include team members in the Health System’s
two Senior Care Centers or the strategic affiliates, which include five
Family Medicine Centers, three Immediate Care Centers and over 40 physician
practices).
The report revealed that Southeast Georgia Health System had direct expenditures
of more than $251,399,000 in 2014. When combined with an economic multiplier
developed by the United States Department of Commerce’s Bureau of
Economic Analysis, the total economic impact of those expenditures was
more than $574,346,000. This output multiplier considers the “ripple”
effect of direct hospital expenditures on other sectors of the economy,
such as medical supplies, durable medical equipment and pharmaceuticals.
Economic multipliers are used to model the resulting impact of a change
in one industry on the “circular flow” of spending within
an economy as a whole.
“This report validates the enormous positive impact Southeast Georgia
Health System contributes to our local economy, and the importance of
our role in meeting the health care needs of the residents of Glynn and
Camden counties as well as our surrounding communities which include Brantley
and McIntosh,” says Michael D. Scherneck, president and chief executive
officer of the Health System. “We are very appreciative of our communities
for their unwavering support of our health system and will continue to
work hard to ensure that the residents of our communities have access
to the best and safest health care services available.”
While Southeast Georgia Health System remains a major component of the
area’s economic engine, the health system’s leadership, like
the rest of the Georgia hospital and health system community, is concerned
about a wide array of economic challenges that have made it increasingly
difficult to meet the community’s health care needs, including a
fast-growing uninsured population and inadequate payments from government
insurance programs Medicare and Medicaid. Presently, 41 percent of all
hospitals in Georgia are operating with negative margins.
“We’re extremely concerned about the current operating environment
for our health system hospitals,” says Scherneck. “We’ve
made a commitment to every citizen of our communities to be there for
them 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. However, our ability to do so is
being compromised when so many of our patients are either uninsured or
severely underinsured.”
According to Scherneck, state lawmakers must work to protect the state’s
health care system with the same fervor that they do other initiatives
like education and public utilities.
“Our health care system is indispensable to our communities,”
Scherneck says. “It is not only the primary guardian of health in
our communities, but it is also a major economic engine in this area that
is responsible for more than 1,800 jobs. It is our hope that our elected
lawmakers will join us in our efforts to protect our health care system
and preserve access to health care for every resident of southeast Georgia.”