ARK CITY — The South Central Kansas Medical Center Board of Trustees approved a contract Thursday morning making interim CEO of the hospital Jeff Bowman its full time CEO.
The contract is for two years. Details of the contract are not yet available.
Bowman, an Ark City native, was appointed as interim CEO in August by the board, which since May has been composed of Ark City city commissioners.
Bowman returned to the area from Texas and is CEO of Transwise LLC, a company specializing in medical consulting in the areas of transcription, billing, administration and IT. Bowman informed the board Thursday he’d be resigning that position to avoid any conflicts of interest.
“He’s shown care and he’s shown drive to get the hospital where it should be,” board member and Ark City commissioner Duane Oestmann told KSOK-NewsCow after the meeting. “In 90 days it’s done a 180-degree turn, basically, so we felt it was time to (make) him permanent.
“We feel he’s doing the right thing.”
The hospital has struggled financially since it opened north of Ark City on U.S. 77 in 2011. Bowman was brought in to stabilize operating costs and the board believes he’s been doing just that. According to a financial report presented during Thursday morning’s meeting, the hospital is on track to reach $1 million in excess revenue over expenses — a figure well over the half-million-dollar goal board members said they hoped for.
Bowman
A year ago, that amount was just $488,132 at this time in 2017. Thursday’s financial report, which tracked numbers through the end of October, stated excess revenue over expenses amounting over $669,000.
Still, the hospital remains on the hook for payments to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas Inc. for $10,000 per week due to over-payments made to the hospital previous to Bowman’s arrival. At the end of the year, those payments rise to $20,000 per week, however hospital officials are hoping a negotiation can be made to keep those payments at $10,000.
Bowman said he’s excited about the opportunity to continue to improve the hospital’s financial standing and prospects for growth.
“I enjoy projects that I can see their return of my time and energy being invested,” Bowman said. “Being from Ark City — I was born at the old hospital and graduated high school (here) — I have a passion here more than I realized I would have, so I’m very excited about this opportunity.”
Bowman said along with financial stability, recruitment will be a goal for the hospital.
“We’ve been able to decrease the accounts payable,” he said. “At one point in time I heard everything was 120 days out, and now we have a large portion of them at only 60 days out. We have a lot of opportunity to grow the hospital with services.”
Bowman acknowledged a shortage of doctors.
“If you look, we had 20-something doctors in the past,” he said. “Now we’re down to six in Ark City.”
SCKMC officials will be traveling to Fort Scott tomorrow for a recruitment fair there. The hospital there is closing at the end of the year and Bowman said medical equipment there will also be looked at.
During the meeting, board members also discussed what the election of Laura Kelly as governor may mean for the hospital, since it is likely she’d sign a bill from the legislature to expand Medicaid in the state. A previous bill passed by the legislature during March 2017 made it to the governor’s desk, but it was vetoed by Sam Brownback before he accepted a federal post appointed by President Donald Trump. A veto override was three votes short of passing in the House later that year in April.
But with the election of Kelly, who has said she’d support Medicaid expansion, there is optimism from the board and Bowman that it could finally become reality in Kansas, and they believe expansion would be a substantial positive for SCKMC.
“That would be a tremendous help for rural hospitals that are definitely underserved,” he said.
Bowman said expansion would increase reimbursement rates to the hospital and decrease write-offs.
“There’s a lot of opportunities there,” he said. “Because there’s a lot of uninsured in our community.”
Bowman said he looked at recent statistics for the hospital and found that out of 7,342 emergency room visits, the hospital had to write off 2,214 of them due to lack of insurance coverage.
“That’s kind of significant number for a small hospital like we are to have to give free service,” he said. “But we will continue to that. We’re here for the patient care, period.”
