By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Doctors Hospital enjoyed a $7.747m revenue boost as a result of administering more than 100,000 COVID-19 tests during the ten months to end-January 2021, it has been revealed.

The BISX-listed healthcare provider, which has just been awarded a $5m loan from an Inter-American Development Bank (IUDBH) affiliate (see article on Page 2B), revealed to shareholders in its annual report for the year to end-January 2021 that the income from COVID testing was the key factor in delivering an 18.6 percent year-over-year increase in total revenues to $76.398m.

The top-line surge also helped Doctors Hospital overcome what it had originally anticipated would be a sharp drop in profitability, after April 2020 resulted in a 44.2 percent year-over-year revenue drop and net loss as numerous services and procedures were either reduced or cancelled due to the pandemic’s start.

The healthcare provider turned around a $351,917, or 16.4 percent, year-over-year decline in net income for its first quarter by transforming it into a 107 percent increase in full-year profits, which more than doubled from the prior year’s $6.009m to $12.439m for the 12 months to end-January 2021.

With a $750,000 investment in capital equipment and laboratory renovations, Doctors Hospital said: “In financial year 2021, COVID-19 testing revenues at Doctors Hospital (Bahamas) were $7.747m associated with the completion of 37,778 RT-PCR and 65,954 rapid antigen tests, the overwhelming majority of which were performed on an outpatient basis and in support of large corporate clients as part of their safe return to work strategies.

“Despite a COVID-19 related decline in outpatient services, emergency room visits and elective procedures in the first quarter of financial year 2021, where revenues and inpatient days declined sharply, the profit structure of Doctors Hospital (Bahamas) recovered robustly toward the end of 2021.

“Net income for Doctors Hospital Bahamas was $6.858m for financial year 2021, a year-over-year increase compared to financial year 2020 of $344,144 or 5.3 percent.” However, besides the testing, the real financial boost came from converting the Doctors Hospital West facility on Blake Road to the care centre for critically ill COVID patients, with bed capacity increasing from eight to 31.

“As a result of these strategic changes, Doctors Hospital West generated net income of $5.581m in financial year 2021, compared to a net loss ($504,245) in the prior year. Inpatient admissions at Doctors Hospital West for COVID-19 care were associated with $7.732m in revenues in financial year 2021,” the annual report said.

“Net patient services revenues increased in financial year 2021 by $11.985m or 18.6 percent compared to the prior year and were $76.398m. Consolidated net profit totaled $12.439m or $1.25 per share for the year compared to a profit of $6.01m or $0.60 per share the year before.

“Net income grew year-over-year by approximately 107 percent and reflects the third consecutive year of record financial performance. Organic revenues (not related to COVID-19) in the final two months of financial year 2021 averaged $6.708m, a noteworthy marker considering pre COVID-19 monthly revenues were $6.373m (March 2020), an uptick versus the comparison period of 5.3 percent,” it added.

“Total expenses for the year were $67.377m versus $60.74m in the prior year, an increase of $6.637m or 10.9 percent. The key drivers of higher overall expenses were salaries and benefits, which were $30.67m in financial year 2021 compared to $27.327m in 2020, an increase of $3.343m or 12.2 percent year-over-year.”

Felix Stubbs, Doctors Hospital’s chairman, unveiled plans to more than double the healthcare provider’s bed capacity by the end of its 2022 financial year this coming January. He wrote: “Pursuing our president and chief executive’s mandate to ‘create capacity’, we obtained a consultant’s (Nelson) evaluation of our main facility in September 2020 and thereafter put in motion a schedule of repair, renovation and change-outs which will see this facility and the health system revise to single rooms with a 60 in-patient capacity.

“Doctors Hospital West building (A) and (B) was developed to accommodate up to 33 patients. Doctors Hospital Harbourside (DHH) is being developed for 30 in-patients downstairs at the completion of Phase One. By the end of fiscal 2022, Doctors Hospital Health Systems will have developed itself into a 123 in-patient capacity organisation.”