Financial Health and Investment Benchmark Study

U.S. healthcare organizations are navigating a persistent financial squeeze where rising expenses driven by labor, expensive specialty drugs, medical supplies and cybersecurity are consistently outpacing reimbursement growth. The HFMA Financial Health and Investment Benchmark Study, sponsored by Fidelity Investments®, provides a data-driven look at how health system finance leaders are responding. Based on research with healthcare CFOs and finance leaders, subject-matter expert interviews and industry research, the report explores where organizations are spending, investing and making strategic changes to strengthen long-term financial health. To counter shrinking operating margins, the findings show that health system CFOs are abandoning traditional, capital-intensive hospital builds in favor of strategic cost containment, balance sheet optimization, and capital-light outpatient expansion.

Key benefits of reading the report:

• Identify cost-containment opportunities across labor, employee benefits, pharmacy, medical supplies and vendor contracts.
• Explore emerging investment strategies for maintaining liquidity, diversifying assets and generating nonoperating revenue.
• Understand how peers are approaching growth, including outpatient expansion, M&A, joint ventures, technology partnerships and philanthropy.
• See where AI is delivering value, as 84% of health systems plan to increase investments in AI amid continued revenue cycle and payer pressures.