MEADVILLE – Franklin County Memorial Hospital is sitting onsolid ground for the first time in years after a recent series ofadministrative and financial changes have pulled it back from theedge of collapse.

FCMH Chief Executive Officer and Meadville Mayor Sonny Dickeysaid the hospital has come under new management and changed itsMedicare reimbursement designation in a move that will allow it toupdate its technology and add more services in the future.

The distinct departure from last year’s financially desperatecondition has allowed the hospital to end a long period of reducedworking hours and increase its total number of employees to 120,Dickey said. He said several workers who were laid off last Junehave been rehired.

“I won’t say (the future is) rosy, but it’s a lot brighter,”Dickey said. “I don’t think we’ll ever be in a rosy position, butwe’ll be in a much more stable position than we’ve been in for thelast 15 or 20 years.”

Dickey said the most important aspect of the hospital’sturnaround is its new classification as a critical access facility,a Medicare reimbursement plan designed to help small, ruralhospitals like FCMH – which has an average patient body that is 80percent Medicare.

Dickey said FCMH’s classification as a critical access hospitalwould allow it to be reimbursed based on the cost of patient careper day, whereas the hospital’s old reimbursement plan – theperspective payment system – was diagnosis based. Under the oldsystem, the hospital would receive the same reimbursement no matterthe length of a patient’s stay. Now, the reimbursement is based oneach day of care.

The only downside to a critical access classification, Dickeysaid, is the name.

“Being a critical access hospital doesn’t mean a patient has tobe in critical condition to come here,” he said. “Critical access,I think, was probably a poor choice of words by (Centers forMedicare and Medicaid Services).”

The extra dollars received under the critical accessclassification will first be spent to upgrade the hospital’s smallradiology department, Dickey said. Plans are to purchase a newX-ray machine, CT scanner and ultrasound machine – all of whichwill be digital to allow quick communication with radiologists inthe area.

Hopes are that an improved radiology department will allowmammography at FCMH, a service that will be able to increasepatient volumes and further the hospital’s growth.

“We know there are people who go to the surrounding areas tohave it done, and there are others who go nowhere and need to haveit done,” Dickey said. “If we can get the lady here to have themammography done, perhaps there are other services we offer shewill have done here also, and perhaps her family will come as well.Mammography sort of opens other doors for you.”

To oversee the hospital’s long-range strategy for growth,Hazlehurst-based Performance Management Group has been contractedto manage the hospital. The company will use its expertise toensure the hospital makes the most of its reimbursement claims.

PMG owner and Medicare reimbursement expert Wade Walters saidFCMH will be the sixth critical access hospital he has overseen,and he has been successful. He said he has never experienced asingle quarter of decreased growth in 17 years.

“We’ll come in and set up a budget, develop a strategic plan tobasically upgrade the hospital and get it to be competitive andservice the community,” Walters said.

Walters said the goal for FCMH is not necessarily to make itcompetitive with hospitals like King’s Daughters Medical Center inBrookhaven or Natchez Regional Medical Center, but to make iscomplementary to those facilities. While KDMC and NRMC offer awider variety of services, FCMH will specialize in the treatment of”swing bed” patients – a Medicare program designed to allowpatients additional recovery time before being discharged.

“We have a different niche,” Walters said. “It complements thehospitals in Brookhaven and Natchez by giving them a place to getsome of the patients they’re going to be losing money on into anarea they can still get good treatment. Because we are cost-based,we can provide the service they need and still get reimbursed forit.”

Small-scale growth at FCMH could begin soon. Dickey said he ispreparing to go on a round of speaking engagements with differentorganizations in the area to spread the word about the hospital’srebirth, and soon he will begin publicizing the facility in localmedia.

Dickey said he will also begin considering plans to bringmedical specialists to FCMH for weekly or monthly visits so arearesidents won’t have to drive far for special services.

“There are a lot of possibilities,” he said. “We’ve just got tolook and see what’s the niche for us.”