Cibola hospital budgets for technology

By Jim Tiffin
Staff Writer

GRANTS — Cibola General Hospital's 2005-2006 $21.5 million budget includes about $1.8 million for capital expenses such as a new CTscanner.

"The hospital tries to be state-of-the-art with equipment and a new CTscan machine will help us continue to give the best service to the community that is possible," said Jeff Rimel, chief financial officer and assistant administrator.

The CTscan machine costs about $900,000, he said.

Also on tap for the hospital is $500,000 for new software and hardware that moves the facility one step closer to all-electronic medical records.

"This will help reduce medical errors and gives the doctor and nurses faster access to medical records and historical medical records," Rimel said.

"It is part of a three-year project," he said.

The other $400,00 is for several other pieces of equipment including fetal monitors, gastroscope, computer radiology and a glidescope video intubation system.

Building upgrades, lighting and an uninterrupted power supply for the laboratory and radiology departments are included.

"Usually a hospital our size does less than 4 percent for capital acquisitions," Rimel said. "The benchmark in the industry is 5 percent. We are putting a lot of money into patient care for our systems to continue to be state-of-the-art. We are doing 13 percent," Rimel said.

"Health care is expensive and we are not an exception to that. Our pricing strategy is to be at the bottom side of the middle, across the board, compared to hospitals in Albuquerque," he said.

"We are trying to give the community good service at the most reasonable pricing. And, we give better care than the big hospitals in Albuquerque. Here we know our patients by name, they are not just a number." he said.

The revenue side of the budget shows slightly more than $7.5 million in medical revenue deductions. Those are payments not made by Medicare and Medicaid, indigent care and charity care.

Net patient revenues are about $13.9 million, and operating revenue is at $2.5 million.

The local mil levy provides about $700,000 in revenue, Sole Community Provider Funds from the state adds about $1.7 million and miscellaneous revenue is about $1200,000.

The revenue percentages are: 32 percent from Medicare, 26 percent from Medicaid. There is also 7.5 percent bad debt.