Details, Details, Details

The ratings reports and the prospectus for the bond issue contain details about the Northwest Arkansas health-care industry and about Washington Regional Health System in particular that aren’t usually publicly available — market share, for example.

Moody’s notes that Washington Regional Medical Center has a 33 percent market share. Springdale’s Northwest Medical Center has 29 percent while Bentonville’s Bates Medical Center has 6 percent of the market, giving Quorum Health Group, which owns both hospital’s, 35 percent of the market. St. Mary’s in Rogers has 18 percent of the market, according to Moody’s report.

Fitch’s numbers are slightly more conservative. It estimates Regional’s market share at 30 percent and puts the hospital’s two nearest competitors — although it doesn’t name them — at 25 percent and 20 percent.

Regional’s active medical staff increased more than 30 percent from the end of 1993 to 1999, according to the prospectus. The largest growth came in 1993 when the hospital added 22 physicians, bringing the total by year’s end to 149, but Regional’s staff also experienced major growth spurts in 1996 (12 doctors added but two left) and 1999 (19 new doctors joined the staff while four left). The hospital had 193 active physicians by the end of December 1999.

The average age of the medical staff at year’s end was 51.

The prospectus also lists the 10 most active admitters on Regional’s staff. Those 10 physicians accounted for nearly 21 percent of 1999 admissions.

A 40-year-old cardiologist was responsible for 2.7 percent while a 38-year-old obstetrician/gynecologist admitted 2.5 percent of Regional’s patients.

Although Washington Regional is licensed for 294 beds, it used only 212 of them in 1999. That’s part of a downward trend over the past five years. In 1994, the hospital used 247 beds, decreasing to 221 in 1996.

But the hospital is filling more of the beds it operates. Occupancy rate averaged 52.8 percent in 1994 — that’s 130 beds — while it was 64.2 percent in 1999 — that’s 136 beds.

There’s been a modest increase of about 4.4 percent in total inpatient days over the five-year period (from 47,604 to 49,699) while admissions have risen 1.3 percent (from 11,142 to 11,288).

At the same time, obstetric inpatient days have risen 22.2 percent (from 2,917 to 3,566) while psychiatric inpatient days are up 19.3 percent (from 4,718 to 5,630).

The number of births at Regional has fallen slightly (1.7 percent) from 2,033 to 1,998. Heart surgeries are up more than 86 percent, from 160 in 1994 to 298 in 1998.