CFO Kenneth Morris: Duke's Top-Level Finance Commissioner

It's no small task to manage and oversee the financial operations of any hospital, which are multi-million dollar institutions, and for Kenneth Morris, he has the task of overseeing the multi-billion dollar Duke University Health System in Durham, N.C.

As CFO of DUHS, Mr. Morris directs the accounting, financial reporting, financial budgeting, billing, insurance, managed care contracting, capital investment and all other things treasury.

Moody's Investors Service has rated DUHS highly over the years, and the health system currently received an Aa2 rating on $300 million of fixed-rate bonds. It is also an affiliate of the Aa1-rated Duke University and Duke Medicine.

Mr. Morris and his "strong management team," as Moody's described it, have consistently produced healthy financial performance (6 percent operating margin and 11.4 percent operating cash flow margin in fiscal year 2011), and as of April 1, DUHS had nearly $1.9 billion of unrestricted cash and investments. Moody's analysts also believe DUHS' defined benefit pension plan is "well-funded," and the health system has a favorable annual debt service coverage of 8.1 times.

Before he joined DUHS, Mr. Morris served as senior vice president of finance at Mission Health System in Asheville, N.C. He also was the vice president for finance and treasurer at Loyola University Health System in Maywood, Ill., and served in the U.S. Army as a commissioned officer.

More Articles on Hospital CFO Profiles:

CFO Kelly Wallace: Driving Financial Stability at Seattle Children's Hospital

CFO Richard Rothberger: Orchestrating Scripps' Financial Health

CFO Jim Spear: Spearheading Finances of the New Cadence Health

© Copyright ASC COMMUNICATIONS 2019. Interested in LINKING to or REPRINTING this content? View our policies by clicking here.