DONIPHAN, Mo. -- Residents in Ripley County are speculating today on whether their hospital could close by the end of the summer.
Hospital officials said Tuesday options have been discussed that could change health care in the county, but would not confirm the type of options that have been presented.
A meeting was held Monday evening between the Ripley County Memorial Hospital Board and SoutheastHEALTH, which oversees the facility in Doniphan.
"There's ongoing challenges that we're faced with operationally and we really discussed with the board that there needs to be some alternative options," said Shauna Hoffman, vice president of marketing and business development for SoutheastHEALTH. "We laid out some of those options for them. We're really not ready to formally disclose what we're going to be doing."
Board members were told operational losses top $500,000 since the beginning of the year, said RCMHB Chairman Freddie Leroux.
"I don't know how to sugar coat it," Leroux said today. "They gave us a lot of reasons why, and they're pretty well done on trying to keep it open, because it's gotten so costly."
SoutheastHEALTH officials gave a time frame of possibly the end of summer, with one option of transforming the hospital into an urgent care, said Leroux.
"It's a business, you have to look at it that way. That's true. You can't just sit there and lose money," he said. "I've always had it (closing) in the back of my mind because the small town hospital has been in trouble for years and years."
Cutbacks on medicaid and medicare, as well increasing costs of insurance and skyrocketing costs of health care present a number of challenges, especially on a small scale, said Leroux.
Leroux believes RCMHB members will meet Wednesday morning with Ripley County commissioners. The item had not been placed on the commission's agenda as of 10 a.m. Tuesday.
No date has been set for the hospital and board to meet again, said Hoffman. The hospital typically meets with the board on a monthly basis, and community engagement group quarterly.
"This is something that is going to take months to put together, to collaborate with the RCMHB on a resolution," Hoffman said. "It really is preliminary right now."
Hoffman said she could not discuss options until the hospital hears formally from RCMHB on what it would like to see done.
"The current model right now, with operational losses is not working," Hoffman said. "That was the conversation. We can't continue to do the same thing. We've got to work together to find a resolution, to look at it differently."
SoutheastHEALTH has seen operational losses of $3.7 million in the past three years, including $551,000 in 2017, Hoffman said.
Anticipated losses for 2018 are $2 million, with sales tax collections factored in, she said.
The hospital itself has an average daily census of one patient, Hoffman said. Hospital figures also show 57 percent of Ripley County medicare beneficiaries are using Poplar Bluff as their main source of health care, she said.
The Doniphan hospital is supported by a 1-cent sales tax. The first half cent was approved by voters in 2010. The second half cent was approved in 2016.
The tax collected just under $500,000 in 2015, according to county clerk Becky York. Collections were $921,454.18 in 2017, she said.
The tax collects about 1 percent of what it takes to operate the hospital, said Leroux, who has been on the hospital board since 2005.
All of the problems faced by the health care industry are much more visible in a hospital like Doniphan's, because of the small scale, he said.
Leroux estimates the emergency room treats more than 6,000 people a year and clinic visits are approximately 22,000.
Closing the hospital could have a devastating domino effect on the community, he said.
It will take away an incentive for people to move to Ripley County, which would impact property values. Losses in population mean losses in sales tax as well, he said. Leroux said it could also mean some of the pharmacies and other businesses connected to the hospital might close.