See Michigan hospitals’ pandemic profits, buoyed by COVID

This is a static image of a map on hospital profits before and during the pandemic. An interactive version with annual profit statements can be found further down the story. (Scott Levin | [email protected])

The first years of the pandemic were undeniably difficult for Michigan hospitals, short on supplies and treatments and filled with COVID-19 patients. For some, they were also profitable.

MLive examined tax records and audited financial statements, along with federal data compiled by a nonprofit, and found some hospitals and health systems posted increases in both operating profits and overall net assets as the crisis raged.

Below is a map of the nonprofit and government hospitals in Michigan. It is color-coded by a gain or loss in operating profits from 2018 to 2021. Click the plots to see an annual breakdown of each hospital's operating profit from 2017 to 2021. The figures are for hospitals individually and don't necessarily reflect the overall earnings for the larger health systems that own many of them.

To collect the information, the National Academy for State Health Policy analyzed hospitals’ annual Medicare cost reports.

Among those that saw margins increase the most from 2018 to 2021 are Metropolitan Hospital in Wyoming (now University of Michigan Health-West), Bronson Methodist Hospital in Kalamazoo, Henry Ford West Bloomfield Hospital, Spectrum Health hospitals on Michigan Avenue in Grand Rapids and Ascension Providence Hospital in Southfield, according to the academy data.

Some hospitals’ names changed through mergers or acquisitions in the last several years. The map represents the hospital names as they were reported in 2021.

Can't see the map? Click here

For many organizations, a large portion of those profits came from COVID relief programs established by the federal government during the pandemic. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, Paycheck Protection Program and Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act provided a total of $178 billion to hospitals and health care providers across the U.S. on the front lines of the COVID response. Michigan providers received a total of more than $4 billion from those programs.

At the top of the list are some of Michigan's largest or most prominent health systems.

Henry Ford Health received $232.5 million. When combined with other Henry Ford health corporations or services, the figure rises to about $341 million. The University of Michigan secured about $256 million. Ascension Providence Hospital in Southfield collected $111 million and in total, Michigan Ascension hospitals and care centers or services received about $441 million.

Spectrum Health, now merged with what was Beaumont Health to form Corewell Health, secured about $98 million while Beaumont health care entities received about $208 million.

Below is a searchable database of more than 14,000 Michigan health care providers that received some amount of money from those federal funds.

Can't see the database? Click here

Read the full story:

During the darkest days of COVID, some Michigan hospitals made 100s of millions

Read more:

Michigan's nonprofit hospitals get big tax breaks. They don't always give much in return.

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