The hospital is on a payment plan to pay off $190,000 in money owed to the city’s electric department. The payment plan requires the hospital to pay $50,000 a month, but there were no payments made in July and August, and the medical center said it could only pay $30,000 toward the bill in September.
Hospital leaders said the recent payment delays were caused by issues with collecting medical debt.
When the newspaper asked Ellwood City Medical Center about the delinquent payments, a spokesperson said: “This arrangement was — and still is — paramount to the medical center becoming a sustainable business and keeping a community hospital in Ellwood. While this payment arrangement is not always easy for us, we understand that our community and our elected officials rely on us upholding it.”
The medical center has faced other financial hurdles in the last year, including payroll issues, according to the report.
Read the full report here.
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