Health Management Associates Reviews

Pros

Benefits are good, people are approachable and take a team approach. Opportunities to advance are good in the organization.

Cons

Does not utilize acuity system for staffing.

Advice to Senior Management

Technology that would enable communication to staff.

Pros

I like my coworkers, we have a great group of hardworking, conscientious people who really care about doing a good job. Most of the doctors are pretty great as well.

Cons

The directors and upper management staff demonstrate no concern or appreciation for their employees. They constantly push for more and more profit and seem to only care about making money for themselves and getting big bonuses. Patients are basically a commodity to the nonclinical managers at HMA to be used as a source of revenue. The only priority at this "health management" company is money! There is a high turnover of employees for good reason.

Advice to Senior Management

I would ask for management to take a good look at their priorities and stop to consider the employees who work very hard but get treated so badly! Stop touting that "Getting 2 Great" slogan and actually do right by your employees for a change! Stop giving huge bonuses to managers who only look good because of someone else's work.

Pros

Co-workers are great.....we have a great supportive team of healthcare associates that give their all to their patients.

Cons

Antiquated equipment...slow with response to employee requests to update needed supplies and equipment.

Pros

Coworkers are wonderful and most truly care about taking good care of the patients. Variety of a la carte benefits are offered.

Cons

Corporate is cheap
Too many silly little rules that make patient care impossible
Always short staffed because people get frustrated with policies and quit
Ugly surroundings
Cater to doctors but don't care about the staff
Old equipment, have to make due

Advice to Senior Management

Instead of giving management bonuses, spend the money on really fixing problems at the patient care level. Stop making us cater to the frequent flyers and drug seekers, they won't pay their bill anyway!

Pros

I was unemployed for almost nine months and was very happy to get a job. The interview process wasn't very hard which should have been a tip off of things to come.

Cons

So far just about everyone that I have worked with in my short time there would rather be working somewhere else. The computer software is so old. They don't even have electronic charting yet and from the looks of it, don't intend to have it any time soon.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop moving management around from hospital to hospital- really see what is happening within the hospital to see what needs to be changed. In less than two months I've already seen a lateral move that made no sense.

Pros

Working with this small community hospital means working with a very professional and caring group of people from nursing, to therapy to ancillary staff. HMA recognizes and supports all levels of staff through multiple recognition programs throughout the year.

Cons

Unfortunately, HMA does not demonstrate recognition of the uncompensated hours the salaried staff must work in order to meet the expectations of the job. Salaried for 40+ (undefined) hours does not even begin to cover the 50-60+ hours it takes to complete a week of home health care. And, the majority of the staff provide exemplery care as evidenced by a large referral base,JACHO compliance and positive patient satisfaction scores. 1-2% raises (with no raises for 2009), no COLA, and the loss of our matching retirement funds has left many of us with a diminishing income that started long before the economy began it's decline.

Advice to Senior Management

As intelligent professionals we all recognize the need to tighten our belts, however we also recognize that our compensation in inequitable and needs to be adjusted.

Pros

I was taught several different jobs in my year at HMA. Upon my arrival at HMA I was taught PBX (switchboard) operations, admissions (collection of patient demographics), and insurance verification of many types.

Cons

The downsides to working at this specific HMA facility are: not knowing what shift you will be working or when, never having a definate schedule, and not being feeling as though your hard work is apprecaited. In my opinion the department that I worked in could have been better managed by someone who had previous knowledge of the admissions aspect of health care.

Advice to Senior Management

Your employees in the admissions department work very hard and should be paid accordingly. Essentailly your hospital could not run effectivley without them. I feel that your hospitals would run smoother if your department heads had knowledge of the work their employees are doing.

Pros

HMA owns several hospitals in mostly rural areas. Hospitals are a necessity for health care and employees working at hospitals will usually maintain employment through bad economical times. The job is less prone to lay offs when compared to other fields of employment.

Cons

HMA focuses on management of rural hospitals. I happen to work at a hospital in Southwest Florida area. Some of the financial practices that HMA has adopted for those small rural hospitals do not work well for the more urban hospital of a larger city. For instance, we have antiquated software that is so time consuming that it is a waste of manpower! Sometimes, we are limited to the type and amount of supplies we need to do our job effectively. Perhaps, these practices work well for more rural hospitals, but, times have changed and technology is the key to healthcare. HMA does not lead the way in technological advances and/or practices.

Also, they seem to hire many individuals that would be overlooked by other hospitals. We have several sharp, educated, sincere employees. However, we have some that are given tasks that are above their scope of understanding. When you work in the medical field, the patient relies on the employee to provide care and expertise. Honestly, I would want to hand pick my nurse should I be admitted to our hospital! The hospital hires many LPNs, perhaps because it costs them less in salaries. And don't get me wrong...there are many LPNs that are even better than an RN. I really do not think that management has a clue as to what makes a good nurse. They have appointed some nurses as Team Leaders and a few of these individuals should not be practicing. I am not sure that HMA really performs a quality background check on employees.

HMA has recently brightened our New Year by telling us that they will not be giving us a raise this year and they will not be matching our 401K contributions. This does not appear to be an effective way to maintain employee satisfaction!
I wonder if Management gets their bonuses! I did hear that they did not get the year end bonus. Why not examine the Upper Management and can one of them! instead of robbing from those faithful, dedicated employees who may make a meager yearly salary (that may be equal to the bonus stipend of Upper Management) Share the wealth among the many dedicated, blue collared workers who are working hard so management does not have to!

Advice to Senior Management

Take care of all employees. Ancillary departments are just as crucial to Nursing as Nursing is crucial to patient satisfaction. I have not figured out a good reason why nurses get salary perks when ancillary staff do not. Nurses would have it very difficult to perforn their jobs if there was no Pharmacy or no Radiology, Lab or Respiratory Department. How can management cater to the nurses when it is all of us that rely on each other to foster the system to provide patient services? Often times only the nursing staff is offered bonuses for extra hours worked.

401K benefits are important. PTO hours equally important. Providing the staff with the right equipment to perform our jobs is a necessity.

I understand that Senior Management has to be concerned with finances. But, honestly, it seems like management is too concerned with the "Almighty Dollar' and not concerned about their employees There has to be a happy medium! Management has difficulty hearing from their employees. Typically, management has no idea how things really happen!
I think they would benefit from on-the-job experience, like working in the various departments, to broaden their understanding. It should not be all abouth the dollar!

HMA has recently brightened our New Year by telling us that they will not be giving us a raise this year and they will not be matching our 401K contributions. This does not appear to be an effective way to maintain employee satisfaction!
I wonder if Management gets their bonuses! I did hear that they did not get the year end bonus. Why not examine the Upper Management and can one of them! instead of robbing from those faithful, dedicated employees who may make a meager yearly salary (that may be equal to the bonus stipend of Upper Management) Share the wealth among the many dedicated, blue collared workers who are working hard so management does not have to!

HMA focuses on management of rural hospitals. I happen to work at a hospital in Southwest Florida area. Some of the financial practices that HMA has adopted for those small rural hospitals do not work well for the more urban hospital of a larger city. For instance, we have antiquated software that is so time consuming that it is a waste of manpower! Sometimes, we are limited to the type and amount of supplies we need to do our job effectively. Perhaps, these practices work well for more rural hospitals, but, times have changed and technology is the key to healthcare. HMA does not lead the way in technological advances and/or practices.

Pros

Hospital benefits are fairly good- employees are 100% covered for services within a HMA facility

Cons

Terrible vacation benefits- only 2 weeks per year for the first 4 years of service!!

Advice to Senior Management

You will lose talent if you don't improve vacation policy and work/life balance

Pros

The corporate staff is so small that one gets a chance to know all the players. In some departments (I guess depending on the manager), developing their employees is top priority. HMA has probably the best CFO training program in the industry.

Cons

Accountants run the company. Therefore, in order to increase margins, they customarily cut costs. Over the years, decreased in spending in infrastructure has come back to haunt the company. What used to be their competitive advantage, Information Systems, has become a burden.

Advice to Senior Management

Look outside the industry for innovations. There comes a point in time that you can't admit everyone under the sun and that payers will decrease payments. If HMA seeks to be the #1 provider of health care services in term of quality, then they should leverage their name nationwide, especially in the Florida and Mississippi markets.

Why start all the initiatives and spend all that money if not to build a recognizable brand? The days of "every market is different" excuse is over. Sole-source markets will be very competitive soon, if not already.

Gain stability. Do things well. Build a brand. Leverage the heck out of it.