Question: If a hospital operates a school of nursing and must subsidize it to keep it going, is this a community benefit?
Recommendation: If a hospital operates an accredited school of nursing and/or school for other allied health professions, all direct and indirect expenses, offset by any dedicated revenue (e.g., tuition or Medicare reimbursement), count as community benefit. This counts because it meets the community benefit objective, advancing knowledge. The What Counts Task Force recommends, however, that the hospital document that the school is being subsidized because there is a need to increase the supply of health professionals in the community and that graduates are not necessarily obligated to work for the hospital (thus the program provides more community benefit than organizational benefit). Include in the category "Health Professions Education."
(February 2011)