The filings present that the Maimonides hospital ended 2021 with simply $148 million in money.
Paul Martinka
One of many largest hospitals in Brooklyn, Maimonides Medical Heart, is at risk of collapse after posting a lack of $145 million final yr and defaulting on a few of its debt obligations, annual monetary filings obtained by The Submit present.
The filings present that the sprawling hospital — so giant, its complicated spans two neighborhoods — ended 2021 with simply $148 million in money readily available, sufficient to final simply one other yr if the present fee of losses endures.
The hospital’s monetary situation is so precarious that its impartial annual monetary report, ready by impartial auditors and obtained by The Submit, warned “these circumstances increase substantial doubt relating to the Medical Heart’s skill to proceed as a going concern inside one yr after the date these consolidated monetary statements are issued.”
“The Medical Heart’s outcomes of operations have been negatively impacted by the persistent stress of healthcare fee reforms enacted lately in addition to altering patterns of healthcare utilization and the COVID-19 pandemic,” the report states.
“This difficult working surroundings has had a detrimental impact on each the inpatient and outpatient segments and its suppliers, leading to losses from operations, money outflows from operations, and violations of economic debt covenants.”
The auditors discovered that the hospital managed to barter new preparations for these loans to keep away from formally defaulting on its money owed, however the 52-page report dated Aug. 26 from accounting agency Worth Waterhouse Cooper highlights simply how precarious Maimonides’s place is at the moment.
The torrent of purple ink comes because the hospital’s administration and southern Brooklyn energy brokers are engaged in a bitter feud over the complicated’s future amid mounting complaints about poor care, dilapidated circumstances and extreme government compensation.
The hospital’s prime boss, CEO Kenneth Gibbs, noticed his compensation practically double in only one yr, from $1.8 million to $3.2 million in 2020 — even because the monetary report obtained by The Submit exhibits the hospital posted a general $16 million loss for the yr.
Complaints about care on the establishment then exploded into view in July when 5 state lawmakers signed onto a letter calling for hearings into the hospital’s operations, citing lengthy wait occasions for care and overwhelmed employees.
The battle took one other twist in August when a type of lawmakers, state Sen. Simcha Felder (D-Brooklyn), labeled one of many teams campaigning to overtake the hospital’s administration — Save Maimonides — as “not kosher.”
“The motion is just not kosher. It’s completely a smear marketing campaign,” Felder mentioned, whose district is closely Orthodox and by which Maimonides is a significant employer.
Allies of the hospital’s present administration have additionally accused its critics of trying to take over the hospital.
The key critics’ group, Save Maimonides, in flip accused Felder of bowing to stress from the hospital’s trustees and administration, who've donated to his campaigns.
“This revelation by considered one of America’s prime accounting companies that Maimonides is on the verge of chapter is surprising however not shocking contemplating the over 2,000 complaints we’ve obtained,” mentioned Mendy Reiner, who co-chairs the coalition.
“New York State should intervene to avoid wasting this significant hospital,” he continued.
Reiner mentioned state officers ought to put Northwell Well being — one of many state’s largest hospital networks, which relies on Lengthy Island — answerable for managing Maimonides.
The 2 entities have already got a partnership, however the relationship is restricted in scope and the 2 stay impartial of one another.
Maimonides is ‘security internet’ hospital — that means most of its sufferers are both uninsured or depend on Medicaid, which pays far lower than personal insurance coverage for procedures, that means the hospital runs on slim margins in the very best of occasions.
That's compounded by its standing as considered one of New York Metropolis’s final remaining main hospitals not owned or tightly built-in into a significant system, like NYU-Langone or Columbia-Presbyterian.
Which means it alone carries the prices of main again workplace operations like billing and operating its pc and information programs.
A spokesman for Maimonides mentioned that the speed of losses had slowed this yr and that hospital executives had been hopeful that monies Albany lawmakers put aside to assist struggling hospitals would assist shut the hole.
“Luckily, the State’s management has acknowledged this downside and made Maimonides eligible to obtain enhanced Medicaid reimbursements that may assist to mitigate the historic deficiency in Medicaid funding,” mentioned a spokesman.
Maimonides is just not alone in its struggles.
Staten Island’s financially troubled Richmond College Medical Heart just lately rejected a plan to hyperlink it with the Huge Apple’s public hospital system as a means to put it aside an estimated $50 million yearly.
One other Brooklyn hospital, Interfaith Medical Heart in BedStuy, was just lately consolidated into two different struggling outer-borough hospitals — collectively now referred to as One Brooklyn Well being — as a part of a state plan to attempt to shore up the borough’s healthcare system by slashing prices and chopping some beds.
It’s at the least the third time within the final 5 many years that Interfaith has been rescued by state officers.
The hospital navigated and emerged from chapter in 2014 with a state-mandated administration group and an infusion of funding.
Interfaith was initially a system of two hospitals — St. John’s Episcopal Hospital, the survivor; and Brooklyn Jewish Hospital — which had been merged collectively in 1982 a bid to repair the failing funds at each establishments.
By 1989, Interfaith was broke once more and block-sized Brooklyn Jewish Hospital was ultimately shut down and transformed into large inexpensive housing complicated.
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