President's Greeting -- May 2012

Members,

Life is about change, whether it is at home, at our hospitals, or at HFMA.  This past year has been about change for me.  My youngest daughter left for college this past fall leaving us empty nesters,  this winter my oldest daughter got engaged, leaving us even more empty nesters next May, if that is possible.

Our hospital continues to try to meet the changes brought about by Healthcare Reform and what it means to the future of our facility and serving our patients.  We have merged our free-standing clinic with our hospital to become provider-based.  We are also actively in the process of creating an affiliation with Salina Regional Health Center.

The Sunflower Chapter, as well as HFMA National, has seen change this year also.  This is the first year in recent years in which the Sunflower Chapter will not be participating in a joint conference with the Missouri chapters.  This decision was made in response to the lack of attendance by Sunflower members.  We also made the decision this year to re-locate the Cost Report Workshp and Quarterly meeting in Wichita beginning in 2013.  Again, this decision was made in response to our membership.  Our goal continues to be to meet the needs of our membership and if we need to accomplish this through change we will do our best to adapt.  HFMA National also began a change as Richard Clarke announced his retirement this past year, Joseph Fifer will become the new President and CEO of HFMA in June.  I am positive that as Dick Clarke has done, Joseph Fifer will continue to lead HFMA National by providing healthcare financial guidance by change to meet the needs of members as dictated by the almost daily changes in healthcare.