Michigan’s nonprofit hospitals spent a record-setting $2.6 billion in community benefits in 2007, according to an annual report out this week from the Michigan Health & Hospital Association.
The hospitals surveyed by the group say they spent $2.6 billion in unreimbursed care during fiscal 2007, up from $1.7 billion in 2006 and $1.4 billion in 2004. The information includes 132 of the state’s 146 nonprofit hospitals.
Community benefits include a wide range of programs and fiscal categories, such as charity care and bad debt, losses on research and education, and a variety of public programs.
Of the $2.6 billion spent by the state’s nonprofits last year, roughly $586 million came from Medicare payment shortfalls and another $606 million from Medicaid payment shortfalls, according to the report. Charity care and bad debt totaled $815 million. Voluntary community benefits, such as losses on research and education, accounted for $331.5 million, and public programs and various community benefit programs and services totaled roughly $250 million.
The state’s sagging economy was partly to blame for the increase in free care, the report said.
“As the state struggles through the growing pains of a changing economy, Michigan residents are faced with increasing uncertainties,” Spencer Johnson, president of the association, said in a statement released with the report. “While Michigan continues to have the highest unemployment rate in the nation, residents should not have to forgo a regular checkup, a necessary medical procedure, or lifesaving prescription drugs.”
About one million people, or 11% of the state’s population, are uninsured.
