The Missouri Hospital Association recently released a Community Betterment Report which outlined Missouri hospital contributions to statewide community health.  The report noted that Missouri hospitals provided more than $1.8 billion in community benefit in 2007, an increase of $200 million from last year’s report, by the 128 Missouri hospitals and four health systems.  More that $117 million of the increase was attributed to the hospitals’ increased provision of uncompensated care.

Hospitals participating in the report voluntarily submitted benefit data for the fiscal year 2007 and are reported at cost.   The data is based on a common set of criteria for each category.  Reported categories include uncompensated care information for both charity care and bad debt, unpaid costs of Medicare beneficiaries – excluding losses resulting from HMO contractual arrangements, unpaid costs of Medicaid beneficiaries, donations, health professionals’ education, and free medical clinics and services.

The following expenses were incurred by Hannibal Regional Hospital during the reported period:

Missouri hospitals are vital to the health and well-being of our state.  Hospitals and health systems provide 113,325 full-time equivalent jobs in Missouri. Currently, Hannibal Regional Hospital is a leading employer in northeast Missouri and has over 1,000 team members on staff.