WASHINGTON NOON ROTARY | CONTRIBUTED
FINDING QUALITY HEALTH CARE: Washington Noon Rotary was recently addressed by Dr. David Herman, CEO of Vidant Health Centers. He spoke of Vidant’s focus on safety and quality of care and the results. Vidant Health recently received a series of top health-care awards and honors for Vidant Medical Center, its tertiary services hub, and system excellence. Dr. Herman stated, “We are very proud of these achievements, which reflect our ongoing progress to improve access, patient experience and outcomes in our region. The number and type of awards shows us that this performance has become the fabric of our daily performance at Vidant Health.” He discussed the financial challenges of keeping a hospital or any other medical facility financially solvent, and made a point of educating his audience about many of the aspects of those challenges. Among them was the fact that about 1/3 of patients actually pay the costs of hospital care for the other 2/3. He stated that 5 percent of the population accounts for 50 percent of healthcare expenditures, and that 50 percent of the population accounts for only 3 percent of healthcare expense. Currently 40 percent of hospital payments are from the government. Other payments are from insurance companies, businesses and individuals. In 2012, there was $2.8 trillion dollars spent on health care, that’s an average of $8,100 per person. Quality healthcare is a complex and challenging business and Vidant continues to look for and implement improvements in the quality of services they deliver.