Lisa Medovich, CFO of Kerrville, Texas-based Peterson Health, said affordable housing is a top challenge for its organization on a recent episode of "Becker's Healthcare Podcast."
High housing costs are making it difficult for many hospitals to retain and recruit staff, leading to some hospitals building employee housing.
Here is an excerpt from the podcast. Click here to download the full episode.
Editor's note: This response was lightly edited for length and clarity.
Lisa Medovich on the affordable housing options Peterson Health is exploring for its staff: I don't think we ever thought a couple of years ago that we would be focusing on housing as part of a service line per se … but we're looking at and exploring alternatives.
There is a university that is within Kerrville called Shriner. We are exploring utilizing and renting out some dormitory rooms — not so much dormitory [rooms], but apartments — that have separate living quarters but shared space for kitchen. We're looking at different Airbnbs and people in the community that are willing to rent because of the fact that it's difficult to find affordable housing. And it also is difficult to rent and find affordable rent. We want to help them with that.
On the horizon, what we're looking at is potentially — not now, maybe five or 10 years from now — building more or less a housing or apartment complex for our folks to live in and/or temporarily live in.