FINANCE

Finance for Non-Financial Managers

Finance for Non-Financial Managers

Tutor Set Assignment - 1

Introduction

This section deals with the first part of assignment. It is basically the financial analysis of a hospital situated in the less affluent city of North America. The paper will critically analyze the financial position of the hospital. The paper will start with the SWOT of the hospital and then will present the achievable improved budgetary control processes. The main objective of this section is to illustrate the quantitative analysis with the use of theoretical framework of case study.

Discussion

St Edith Memorial Hospital (SE) is located in a city of North America. The city is not very wealthy. It is a public hospital serving the steady population of the city. The main source of revenue of the hospital is the grants from the federal government. The hospital has two other funding sources. The City Council and the privately held medical insurance companies both provide almost 35% of the total funding. The hospital has a strong competition with the Neighbouring Hospital in the city.

SWOT Analysis

A firm can identify certain weaknesses here and can work on minimizing or eliminating them. The firm can also make future decisions about the prevailing threats and can devise plans to take to full advantage of the opportunities (Koch, 2000,). The analysis also assists any firm in identifying the factors which can help in growth, and also identify any obstacles and hurdles which will hinder the growth prospects (Panagiotou, 2003, pp. 9).

Strengths

The hospital has a very compassionate and caring staff that works in a team and very committed and has the ability to pull together in case of any need. The St. Memorial Hospital has lower variable cost per staff. This cost is calculated by adding the drugs, catering, and the laundry costs. The total sum is divided by the number of staff. The SE hospital has variable cost per member of staff is 32 and 29.0 for the year 2010 and 2009 respectively. The neighbouring hospital is far behind the SE hospital in this regard. This hospital is standing at 38.2 and 33.9 for the respective years mention above. The neighbouring hospital also has to bear higher variable cost on the treatment of per patient. The variable costs per patient for the SE and the neighbouring hospital are 3.0 and 3.3. These are for the year 2010. In the year 2009, this cost was 2.6 and 3.12 for SE and the neighbouring hospital.

Weaknesses

The hospital leads to several weaknesses like poor performing staff. The hospital does not have a proper mission and vision statement. Patients have to wait for almost three months (90 days and 95 days in 2009 and 2010 respectively) for check-up with the surgeons. The hospital under review is lacking a proper research and development department. The lesser amount of beds that the SE hospital has is not helping the main cause of the hospital. The hospital is almost 100 beds short from the competitor hospital.

Opportunities

SE hospital can increase the number of ...