The Cherry County Hospital Board of Trustees met for their regular monthly meeting Monday evening beginning at about 5pm at the hospital meeting room.
The hospital is working on a new policy that would not charge interest to patients who are making payments. Stephanie Jacobson, the hospital’s current CFO stated that it is not “best practice” to do so, stating further that very few hospitals charge interest to patients who are making payments.
During the finance committee report, it was noted that due to recent departures from the office’s staff members, billing is several weeks if not months behind. The hospital will likely be outsourcing some of the billing and coding duties to a Nebraska-based company contacted by Cherry County Hospital to help with the back log of billing that needs to be sent-out to their patients.
Jacobson stated that “timely” billing would be 5-10 days, but it was unknown how long it would be before the office would be caught up.
The board set December 11 at 5pm for a special meeting, at which time auditors would present their report, and this should also be the meeting when a new CEO might be named.
Due to the Christmas holiday, the regular December meeting will not be held until Monday January 8th at 5pm, and the January meeting on its regular date, January 29th.