Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center continued a trend of positive financial performance during fiscal year 2012-13, in a year highlighted by clinical growth, new or expanded health system collaborations, innovative approaches to research support and the opening of the freestanding home of Penn State Hershey Children’s Hospital, reported Dr. Harold L. Paz, chief executive officer of Penn State Hershey Medical Center and Health System, Penn State’s senior vice president for health affairs and dean of the Penn State College of Medicine.
Paz told faculty, staff and community members at today’s annual public board of directors meeting that during fiscal year 2013, outpatient visits increased by 2 percent from the previous year to more than 911,000. Surgical cases were more than 27,700, up 0.5 percent and following a national, industry-wide trend of many surgical procedures moving to the outpatient setting. Overall hospital admissions were more than 27,700, up 2.4 percent from the previous year and Emergency Department visits increased by 4.2 percent to more than 67,000.
Yet this success comes amid a vastly changing landscape of increasing competition and health system integration, reduced National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding for research and health care reform. Paz also introduced elements of the organization’s new five-year strategic plan to ensure its continued success amid these changes, a vision he said centers on the innovative spirit of all 9,000 Penn State Hershey employees.
“Our success over the past several years has been due in large part to the dedication and hard work of our faculty and staff,” Paz said. “However, our landscape is changing rapidly and we must change with it. We need to tap into the creativity and innovation of our people in order to remain strong, provide patient care of the highest quality and value, conduct inspired research, and produce a new generation of health and science professionals prepared to meet the health care needs of the future.”
The new strategic plan is built around five “strategic imperatives”:
-- Achieve the highest level of quality, safety and value
-- Educate and invest in our people for personal and professional success
-- Create an extraordinary patient experience
-- Create innovation through research
-- Develop and differentiate our regional integrated academic health care system
In June, Penn State Hershey launched the new Center for Enterprise Innovation to help departments, institutes and outpatient practices increase efficiency, improve patient access, find cost savings, generate new revenue and increase the value the organization provides across its services.
Paz outlined a plan to generate $125 million over the next three years through more efficient delivery of patient care across its health system, increased clinical productivity, more efficient staffing practices, decreased supply chain costs and market growth. Paz described the goal as critical to helping the organization maintain success across all of its missions in the face of health care reform, a changing health care marketplace and reduced government support for research and education.
During the meeting Paz highlighted several examples of change projects driven by physicians and staff, including:
-- The neurology department established an innovative patient access team to evaluate new patients and get them in for appointments more quickly. The result was a big drop in average wait times for a new appointment – from 299 days to just nine days.
-- A unit that treats trauma, emergency surgery and bariatric patients put new processes in place to reduce pressure ulcers, a painful and potentially serious complication. The simple steps they took reduced the number of pressure ulcers from nine (in a two-year period) to zero in 2013. This effort not only improved the quality of care and patient outcomes but resulted in a savings estimated to be more than $600,000 in health care costs.
In February, the new 263,000-square-foot home of Penn State Hershey Children’s Hospital opened to patients, signaling a new era of comprehensive patient- and family-centered care for children in central Pennsylvania. The Children’s Hospital also earned its place among the nation’s best this year for the third year in a row, earning recognition in five specialties from U.S. News and World Report’s Best Children’s Hospitals rankings.
For another example of an exciting clinical initiative from the past fiscal year, watch this video: