Dr. Tommy Ibrahim, President & CEO, contributes a regular column to The Freeman's Journal, Hometown Oneonta, and AllOtsego.com. The piece below was published in July 6 editions.
Dear Friends, Neighbors, and Colleagues,
Recent national news reports have called into question annual charity care spending at nonprofit hospitals across the U.S. despite rising operating profits and cash reserves. Charity care, which is free or discounted medical services that hospitals and health systems offer to patients who otherwise cannot afford treatment, includes inpatient and emergency room care. Some people with medical insurance also qualify for charity care services if their hospital bills are not fully covered.
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires nonprofit hospitals to provide charity care to uphold their nonprofit status with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Hospitals have the liberty of establishing their own criteria for who qualifies for this assistance – and how much charity care they ultimately offer annually. Nonprofit hospitals are obligated to share and distribute information about the charity services they offer in different ways – throughout Bassett Healthcare Network, we display details about our programs in lobbies, waiting areas, at registration desks, in examination rooms, and in other public spaces. Charity care is an essential part of the health services we offer. However, while it is important to engage in conversations about national trends in charity care spending in the context of community health needs, circulating criticism of perceived decreases in this spending at hospitals is ultimately short-sighted. There are many more programs and services that hospitals coordinate to connect populations with assistance and resources as part of their deep commitment to community health and wellness.
At Bassett Healthcare Network, our programs dedicated to community needs are vast. Here are a few examples that make a difference every day:
- Bassett’s School-Based Health Program, which provides more than 7,000 children annually with medical, dental, and mental health services at no cost across 17 school districts and 21 schools.
- Bassett’s New York Center for Agricultural Medicine & Health (NYCAMH), which offers medical care, mental health care, wellness education, and farm safety equipment to agricultural workers through state and federally funded grants across 12 states (including the installation of more than 3,250 rollbars on tractors to prevent rollovers totaling over $5,200,000 over three decades – at no cost to farmers across Central New York).
- Bassett’s mobile cancer coach, in partnership with the Cancer Services Program (CSP), provides no cost mammograms, clinical breast exams, Pap tests, pelvic exams, and take-home FIT (Fecal Immunochemical Test) kits for uninsured and underinsured individuals 40 and over. CSP mobile coach pop-up events take place across the region served by Bassett, including in Otsego, Delaware, Schoharie, Herkimer, Madison, and Oneida counties.
- Bassett’s in-hospital food pantries that supply non-perishable goods to patients and community members experiencing food insecurity.
Many other Bassett programs, funded by grants and donations, provide transportation to patients in rural areas (including patients receiving cancer treatments), assistance with prescription drug costs, and support community education related to trauma prevention and awareness, birthing preparation and car seat safety, CPR, and much more. While surface-level financial reviews of hospitals across the country may appear to reveal alleged decreases in charity care related to overall cash flow, there is much more to the story. In fact, Bassett Healthcare Network’s charity care spending increased between 2021 and 2022 by nearly 40 percent across all five of its hospitals. This, notwithstanding unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, reflects our organization’s ongoing efforts to optimize resources and create sustainable care in a changing healthcare environment.
I urge all community members and healthcare consumers to consider a global perspective related to charity and subsidized care in hospitals as you research assistance options – a June 2022 report from the American Hospital Association (AHA) illustrates that nonprofit hospitals in the U.S. provided more than $110 billion in total benefits to their communities between 2019 and 2021 alone.
Hospitals and healthcare systems are in the business of providing care and healing – our communities depend on us. No two community assistance programs are alike – especially in a rural service area like Bassett’s – and we are proud to offer needed resources to our populations in both traditional and nontraditional settings, as we have done for more than a century. It is a privilege to serve you.
Sincerely,
Dr. Tommy Ibrahim
President & CEO
Bassett Healthcare Network
You can read the post on All Otsego here.
