IHA releases latest data trends
IHA has collected data from 100 hospitals for January-December 2022 as compared with the same time frame in 2021:

• Acute discharges decreased 1.6% as acute patient days decreased 2.1%.
• Hospital-based ambulatory surgery visits increased 3.2%.
• Average facility paid hours increased 4.5%.
• Average length of stay stayed the same.
• Average physician paid hours increased 15.8%.
• Births increased 3.9%.
• Charity care decreased 4.6%.
• Emergency department visits increased 4.3%.
• Facility employment (excluding physicians) increased 4.5%.
• Inpatient admissions from the emergency department decreased 2.2%.
• Inpatient surgeries decreased 11.9%.
• Medicaid acute discharges decreased 4.5% and Medicaid acute patient days decreased 2.5%.
• Net patient revenue (collected charges) increased 5.4%.
• Outpatient utilization increased 3.6%.
• Payroll and benefits expense increased 10%.
• Total average paid hours increased 7%.
• Total expenses increased 7%.
• Uncompensated care (bad debts) increased 11.6%.

Registration open for ISHHRA spring conference
Building and retaining a strong health care workforce is the focus of the 2023 Iowa Society for Health Care Human Resources Administration Spring Conference. Participants will learn from Joe Collins with the Iowa Department of Education and Kent Storm with Iowa HOSA – Future Health Professionals about creating health care workforce pipelines. They also will review resources to engage and prepare students for a health care career.

Other sessions include:

• Legal updates affecting health care workers.
• Networking with peers.
• Strategies to retain top performers.

The conference is scheduled from 8:30 a.m.-4 p.m. Wednesday, April 19.

New guidance provides tips to prevent ransomware threat
A global ransomware threat has compromised more than 3,800 VMware ESXI servers. The ransomware exploits vulnerabilities in servers to deploy script that encrypts configuration files and may render virtual machines unusable.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and FBI released guidance to help organizations prevent and recover from the ransomware threat. The agencies encourage organizations managing VMware ESXI servers to update to the latest software and ransomware victims to run a CISA script that may help them recover their files.

FEMA COVID-19 public assistance to end May 11
The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced the incident period for public assistance funding for eligible COVID-19-related work and reimbursable costs are ending with the COVID-19 public health emergencies on May 11. The public assistance program provides disaster response grants to nonprofit health care organizations and others. The agency expects to host briefings and webinars for affected stakeholders.