Community Health Systems Inc. (NYSE: CYH) continues to see an increase in surgery volumes, partly driven by outpatient procedures, including those taking place at the organization’s ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs).
In fact, the second quarter of 2024 saw record surgical volumes at Community Health Systems.
“We were pleased to see same-store surgical volumes reaching yet [another] new high in the second quarter this year,” CEO Tim Hingtgen said during the company’s Q2 2024 earnings call.
Hingtgen added that the volumes are building on the company’s record surgery volume from the previous year.
“This progress is driven in part by particularly strong outpatient case volumes, including in our ambulatory surgery centers, whose performance and results are complementary to their local affiliated CHS health systems,” Hingtgen noted.
The Franklin, Tennessee-based Community Health Systems reported net operating revenues of $3.14 billion for Q2 2024, up slightly compared to about $3.12 billion during the same period in 2023.
Of the company’s Q2 2024 net revenue, 52.9% came from its outpatient business. That was in line with 2023’s second quarter.
“We also experienced generally strong outpatient volumes, including growth in emergency department visits, urgent care and in physician practices,” Hingtgen said.
Community Health Systems manages health care systems in 40 markets across 15 states. Through subsidiaries, it owns or leases 71 hospitals with over 11,000 beds and operates more than 1,000 care sites, including physician practices, urgent care centers, freestanding emergency departments, occupational medicine clinics, imaging centers, cancer centers and ambulatory surgery centers.
”We’ve invested more than $3 billion into our health systems since 2018, which includes new and replacement hospital facilities, bed and procedural space expansion, new technologies, and a wide spectrum of access points and outpatient services,” Hingtgen said.
The health care company will look to continue growing its outpatient business – including its ASC portfolio – moving forward, the CEO suggested.
One pathway to doing that is through joint ventures.
“The good, strong outpatient surgery growth that we’ve referenced earlier, obviously, was specific – a specific area that we targeted over the last several years, including with our ambulatory surgery center investments with joint venture partnerships,” Hingtgen said. “So we’ve been really deliberate about making sure we’re putting outpatient access where our consumers want it and need it, so that we can continue to capture more of the total share of spend in our markets.”
