James Siegel has been senior vice president and CFO of Richmond, Va.-based VCU Health for around four-and-a-half years, but in that time, the health system has significantly invested in both ambulatory and inpatient assets.
“VCU Health is known for the high acute, tertiary and quaternary care that they deliver,” Mr. Siegel said during a Becker’s CFO+Revenue Cycle Podcast episode. “We want to bring that level of care out into the community, in an ambulatory setting … the community demands that level of care, and we want to bring it to where they live.”
Some of VCU Health’s recent projects include a 615,000-square-foot, $384 million Adult Outpatient Pavilion, which opened in December 2021.
VCU Health opened a 39-bed comprehensive Liver Care Unit at VCU Medical Center in Richmond earlier this year to address the growing need for liver care. It will be complemented by the opening of its liver disease and metabolic health clinic later this fall. VCU Health also just broke ground on an ambulatory surgery center and medical office building in Chesterfield County, Va., that will open in 2027.
The health system opened its Children’s Tower in late April of 2023, which has brought significant growth to children’s emergency department visits, discharges, surgeries and outpatient clinic visits. An expansion is in process to add 20 more neonatal intensive care beds in 2026, and 24 additional inpatient acute beds in 2027.
“We are making critical investments in ambulatory, inpatient children, inpatient adults and some of the most critical services that VCU Health provides like transplant, cardiology, orthopedics, cancer, etcetera,” he said. “All of these investments have continued to contribute to VCU Health, achieving a compound annual growth rate in terms of revenue growth since 2021 of almost 12%, so fantastic growth over the last four-plus years.”
For other system leaders looking to invest in ambulatory growth, Mr. Siegel said the key is to make care convenient for patients.
“Convenience comes in a variety of ways,” he said. “If you can’t make care easy to access, patients can’t get in your front door.”
