It's been a familiar story in recent months of healthcare systems seeing their expenses far outpace their revenues.
While revenues in many cases have grown from the same period in 2021, expenses have generally increased at a much higher rate, helping to drag down the 2022 financials of many nonprofit healthcare systems.
Optimism, while faint, is growing among some observers that hospital systems will at least start to break even at some point in 2023. It's what makes the latest financial results from California's Stanford Medicine worth looking at.
Stanford Medicine reported operating revenues of $1.9 billion for the three months ending Nov. 30, 2022, compared with $1.75 billion for the same period in 2021.
Expenses for the 2022 period were $1.79 billion, still up from the same period in 2021 but at least lower than the revenue total.
To be fair, Stanford showed similar financial strength when reporting its fiscal year 2022 results ending Aug. 31. Revenues also outpaced expenses at that time, too, even as such expenses were elevated from 2021 levels.
Stanford Medicine has an "AA" credit rating and stable outlook with Fitch because of its extensive clinical reach in a highly competitive market and an improving financial profile.