As more hospitals and health systems nationwide shutter maternity care services, Philadelphia-based Temple Health is bucking the trend with the opening of a new women’s and family hospital designed to tackle the growing maternity care crisis in the area it serves.
“It’s a big, bold move because across the Philadelphia area, 13 out of 19 maternity centers or programs have closed since 1997, creating a regional access crisis,” Jerry Oetzel, CFO of Temple Health, said during a Becker’s CFO+Revenue Cycle Podcast episode. “The closing of all these programs … is showing up in our infant mortality rates across Philadelphia. If you look at infant mortality rates in poor communities within the greater Philadelphia area, they are three times higher than the national average.”
Mr. Oetzel said Temple University Hospital’s main campus in Philadelphia provides care to more than 5,000 pregnant women annually, but less than one-third deliver their babies there, opting to find care closer to home.
This prompted Temple to build the Temple Women and Families Hospital in an effort to broaden care access in the region. The hospital officially began inpatient maternity, labor and delivery, and neonatal ICU services on Sept. 3. It has 385 employees and comprises 32 private maternity rooms, 41 neonatal intensive care unit beds, 13 labor rooms, seven labor and delivery triage beds, two L&D operating rooms, eight adult ICU rooms, six operating rooms and six direct-referral unit beds, according to a fact sheet shared with Becker’s.
“We also are going to be investing heavily in wraparound services for prenatal and postpartum care,” Mr. Oetzel. “In the end, we’re betting that … our women’s maternity program is going to be a model that could be duplicated by other communities.”
Temple purchased the facility and assets for $12 million from the Cancer Treatment Centers of America. It has also invested $62.6 million in partnership with the state.
“We’re doing the right thing for our patients,” Mr. Oetzel said. “We looked at outcomes, and they just weren’t acceptable for the community. They were probably in and around what a third world nation runs out in terms of mortality, so [we] put our dollars where our mouth is. We are investing heavily in outcome driven programs, and I believe that dollars will follow.”
