Hospital board meets
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The Ringgold County Hospital’s board of trustees met Monday, August 26 for their regular monthly meeting.
Along with departmental reports, the board heard information on insurance coverage and the ongoing evaluation process of employees among other miscellaneous items on the agenda.
Cam James of Assured Partners Insurance in West Des Moines was present to give an outline and summary of Ringgold County Hospital’s current insurance policies and coverage.
James started off by stating that property claims in particular have risen significantly with premiums collected not covering the payouts.
Iowa is ranked the second worst state in the country, from an insurance standpoint, for property claims due to the number of those being weather related.
With that being the case, James informed the board that premiums will increase in the next 12-18 months.
To compare the difference in property damage coverage and cost—wind/hail damage claims carry a 1% deductible- approximated $350K for the current 35M coverage in place for RCH, while a fire deductible is only $10K.
Moving on to the area of professional liability coverage, James indicated a recent tort reform bill just passed in Iowa caps non economic impact claims at $2M- a positive for the hospital and providers.
Cyber liability has shown the largest percent increase at 30-40 percent. While dollar-wise the increase is not that much, he suggested it was an area to keep an eye on the next 6-12 months. The limit for the current RCH policy is $5M.
Good news was shared for RCH in the area of workman’s compensation insurance. Those claims are only 0.8% for RCH claims resulting in the hospital performing lower than the average in the state of Iowa. With that, the hospital receives a 20% discount for controlling claims from a work/comp standpoint.
An average hospital comparative to RCH’s size pays $7500 in premium with RCH paying a little over $5K.
Looking at the combined factors of increasing premiums and the need for high amounts of coverage to adequately protect rural critical care hospitals like RCH, insurance companies are considering a shared insurance program where there would be a larger pool to pull from, with facilities still paying individual premiums. Hospitals with higher security protocols would see a lower premium.
After hearing the information presented board members discussed and asked questions about specific coverage for RCH’s current insurance policies and concluded that portion of the meeting satisfied with current policies and coverage.
Nicky Gilbertson, CEO, gave an update on strategic plans for employees.
A current community service policy will be discontinued, with the same goals still being set, but those goals will be for one year at a time rather than carried over year to year.
Evaluation of employees will move to a 5 point scale and a weighted system for goals with emphasis on department and individual goals. A 5 point system is composed of 5 performance markers— with those five being: does not meet, partially meets, meets all expectations, exceeds all expectations and exceptional.
With this system Gilbertson said they are working toward a merit based system rather than a “one size fits all”.
She went on to add this would create an opportunity to reward employees exceeding expectations with financial reward. Gilbertson concluded this will not be happening this year, but the ultimate goal would be to see it happen at some point.
The annual employee night has been set for September 4 to recognize and celebrate great staff and their families with “food, fun and talent”.
In new business a depository resolution was presented for review. This has not been reviewed or updated since May 2020.
With two banks having name changes it is necessary to update the names and location of home offices and local offices for clarity. Tessa Barnes, board member, indicated she would like to see more inclusion of other area banks. After board discussion, BTC Bank in Lamoni was added to the list of banks used.
A request for a capital expense approval was also presented by Clint Reynolds, CFO. The request would be for changing from full services for TV and Internet now provided by MediaCom to Direct TV. The total cost for equipment and labor would be $21,432.
Karleen Stephens, board member, suggested that before approving the capital request MediaCom should be approached to see if they could meet Direct TV’s rates and services and also looking at other providers. After discussion it was agreed that Reynolds would go back and revisit conversation with MediaCom and to also look at what other companies could provide comparatively.
Concluding the regular meeting, the board moved into closed session citing Iowa Code section 21.5 (1) (1).
