The financial status of Catholic hospitals: 1982-1983

Recently available figures for 1982 and 1983 show that Catholic hospitals as a whole attained positive ratios of net income to fund balances and that these gains exceeded inflation in both years. The financial picture varies, however, when data for specific categories of Catholic hospitals are examined. For example, smaller hospitals relied more on borrowed funds to finance assets and generate profits, and for many of them these profits still did not exceed the 1983 inflation rate. Hospitals particularly vulnerable to diagnosis-related group payment--that is, teaching hospitals, hospitals with negative operating income, and hospitals adding beds--possessed less liquidity than Catholic hospitals aggregately. Hospitals in each of these categories experienced less-than-average basic profitability as well.