Press Release
07/10/2008
For Immediate Release
SJRMC/Mishawaka Inpatient Services Transitioning to South Bend
As construction and interior work continues at the new $355 million world-class Saint Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka, the hospital will begin the merger of some departments between its two current facilities in South Bend and Mishawaka. This transition will be complete on June 30, 2008.
All Acute Inpatient Services, Inpatient and Outpatient Surgical, Critical Care, Medical Surgical, and Obstetrics from SJRMC/Mishawaka will completely transition to the SJRMC/South Bend Campus. The Mishawaka location will continue to offer Emergency Services, Wound Healing Center, Laboratory, and Radiology Services.
All departments from both SJRMC’s South Bend and Mishawaka Campuses will completely transition to the new hospital in Mishawaka and will be fully functional when it opens in the Fall 2009.
This transition will allow for SJRMC/Mishawaka to continue providing emergency care and associated support services, and to merge services that do not rely as heavily on location to the South Bend facility.
Many factors were taken into consideration in regard to the timing of this transition. The Summer is historically the time for lower patient census, making the timing of this transition most practical, rather than delaying any further into peak periods which would make the transition logistically more difficult.
The proactive decision to accelerate this transition was also necessary so that SJRMC can continue providing for the many patients it serves throughout Michiana and the surrounding communities while faced with unprecedented financial challenges. SJRMC/Mishawaka provides care to large volumes of Medicaid patients. The Indiana Medicaid Program currently pays approximately 40% of the hospital’s cost of providing care to this group of patients. This reimbursement has not increased since 2004, meaning SJRMC receives only 48 cents of payment for every dollar of cost to provide care to those patients. SJRMC’s overall bad debt, which is patients’ inability to pay, has increased 18% system wide.
In order to help hospitals such as SJRMC/Mishawaka, that provide care to large volumes of Medicaid patients, the state has provided additional disproportionate share (DSH) dollars to supplement the underpayment in the base rate. These payments have historically been received several years in arrears. While SJRMC recently received its DSH payments for 2006, 2007, and 2008 in May 2008, the hospital received approximately half of the amount due its Mishawaka facility as the state has experienced a funding shortfall. In addition to the partial payments made to Mishawaka, the state diverted another $2.7 million that was owed SJRMC for care of other patients in another state-funded program.
While this transition will help SJRMC absorb these financial challenges, the merging of like departments between both South Bend and Mishawaka hospitals will allow for many Associates to assume parallel positions as well as reduce staff. Any reductions will come first from Administrative levels, but all levels will have some. SJRMC will reduce its workforce by 60 positions. This is a combined total of positions from South Bend, Mishawaka, Plymouth, and our corporate system (SJRMC, Inc.).