COVID-19 has once again reared its head in Ellsworth County.

At the Aug. 16 meeting of the Ellsworth County Medical Center board of directors, Administrator Jim Kirkbride said the hospital has recently seen a few patients with COVID-like symptoms and also one admission.

Kirkbride noted these instances were nothing severe and he was not concerned about it. He also noted the hospital is treating patients with other seasonal illnesses such as the flu and strep.

In other business:

• Executive Director of Ancillary and Support Services Danette Heinze said the hospital administration has developed a strategic plan to address tasks that are to be evaluated and implemented at the hospital.

Using a five pillar approach, these tasks will be rotated through the process from start to finish based on a set time frame. One of the tasks to be evaluated is inhouse mammography.

“It’s a continuous moving document,” Heinze said.

• Kirkbride said for the month of July the hospital had three employees leave — one part-time and two full-time. In the last 12 months, ECMC has seen 44 employees leave, which is a 33 percent turnover rate.

• Executive Director of Finance Charles Lewing said July was a pretty good month financially for the hospital. He said ECMC had a gross revenue for the month of $2,324,309, with a net revenue of $1,782,665. Revenue from the 340B discount drug program was also good at $123,273 for the month. The hospital has $8.95 million in total assets.

Lewing said the number of inpatient days has increased significantly at ECMC, from 21 days in June to 63 in July. The same is true for swing bed days at the hospital. These have increased from 21 days in June to 50 in July. The number of emergency room visits has also increased from 189 visits in June to 232 in July.

He said the hospital is well ahead this year of where it was at this point last year.

“Not a bad way to start the year,” Lewing said.

• Rural Health Clinic and Community Outreach Director Tina Davis said patient numbers at the rural health clinic are going back to pre-COVID levels. She said that is largely because the full-time hospitalist position has been filled and patients are able to get in and be seen. That and other services are leading to the increased potential of earnings for ECMC.

Specifically, Davis said the hospital’s foot care service has doubled.

“Being able to provide that service has been very popular,” she said.

Davis also noted the rules for coding medical services are constantly changing and a team at ECMC has been developed to train employees in coding to take advantage of the opportunity to collect revenue that is already available to the hospital. Year-to-date, the hospital has seen a revenue increase of $40,036.80.

“This is a good example of educating our staff,” Kirkbride said.

After an executive session to discuss non-elected personnel (appointments and reappointments) the following providers were approved with initial appointments:

• Jennifer Warren, APRN-C — Docs Who Care

• Shannon Hurl, NP — Docs Who Care

• Ross Binford, PA — ECMC Medical Group

• Scott Gregory, MD — Holistic Pain Management

• Karolina Woronieska, MD – Holistic Pain Management The following provider was approved for reappointment — Ken Baxa, MD, ECMC Specialty Clinic, Rheumatology.

The next meeting of the Ellsworth County Medical Center board of directors will be at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 28, in the hospital conference room.