How to Reduce Hospital Operational Costs Without Sacrificing Patient Care

Times are tight for all kinds of properties right now, but they’re particularly devastating for healthcare facilities. Consider these factors:

• Healthcare costs continue to escalate, making operating costs a key focus for administrators.
• To become more competitive, hospitals are merging and trying to meet market needs at lower costs.
• It takes five years to design and build a new hospital, but there has to be a compelling service offering and revenue growth forecast to build a capital campaign on.
• Medicare costs are climbing for many reasons, including the U.S.’s aging population. These cost increases are further limiting hospital revenue, even though they are at 90%+ capacity now.
• Many hospitals are restructuring/retiring operations staff and not replacing them (or they can’t find qualified people), making efficiency that much harder to sustain.

Hospital common area, from Richard Angel Gomez on Unsplash

While "operate at a lower cost" is an obvious solution to any financial problem, how to go about that is anything but obvious. So here's some straight talk about what actually works.

After 45+ years in the business, the most consistent, effective, low-cost approach we’ve found to achieving and sustaining lower operating costs is this: energy plant monitoring. Here's why.

Why Our Energy Plant Services Reliably Succeed

1. There’s no capital cost beyond the needed meters and data collection/transfer devices.

2. If desired, we provide training for your central utility plant operators on how to operate more efficiently.

3. You get technical support in plant operations from our Operations Center experts at a time when the service quality of equipment manufacturers is at an all-time low (even though they keep raising service costs).

4. We constantly identify and qualify methods of further reducing operating costs.

5.  We assist with the utility rebates and incentive programs to defray the implementation cost of new, more-efficient assets.

6. Our analysis improves the reliability/performance of HVAC systems, troubleshoots problems and keeps the chiller service and automation companies honest on the services you’re already paying for.

7.  You get clear analyses of financial options for more accurate budgeting.

8. We act as an independent third-party M&V on any new plant equipment or systems installed so you get more value from the very beginning.

Don't Take Our Word for It

Yes, we’re tooting our own horn on this issue because plant monitoring is one of our major service offerings. But we're not the only ones you can ask. Monitoring clients such as NYU Langone, Memorial Sloan Kettering, New York Presbyterian, and Hackensack Meridian Hospital can attest to saving 10%–12% per year through our monitoring services.

The painful truth is that healthcare costs will continue to go up. Reducing operational costs is one of the few ways healthcare facilities can make their numbers and stay in business. There are lower-cost, efficient ways to meet both patient comfort and budget requirements. If you'd like to talk specifics for your site, reach out.