(Reuters) -HCA Healthcare Inc on Friday forecast lower-than-expected profit for this year after a weak fourth quarter due to staff shortages and a slow recovery in non-urgent procedures, sending the hospital operator’s shares down about 4%.
A prolonged COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a nationwide shortage of healthcare staff, which has kept hospital operators from resuming high-margin elective procedures at full pace.
HCA Healthcare, the largest for-profit hospital operator in the United States and the first to report quarterly earnings, cited impact from the COVID-19 pandemic and high inflation for its disappointing annual profit forecast.
HCA forecast its 2023 adjusted profit in the range of $16.40 to $17.60 per share, compared with analysts’ average expectation of $18.23, according to Refinitiv IBES data.
“The top line looks roughly similar to our expectations, but the bottomline looks weaker, suggesting that inflationary pressures such as labor challenges may still constrain results in 2023,” said Morningstar analyst Julie Utterback.
In the fourth quarter, which saw the “tripledemic” of flu, COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), HCA recorded a 5.7% increase in equivalent admission to 931,990, but surgery volumes were largely flat compared to a year earlier.
The weak quarter was a result of a Florida hospital shutdown and higher expenses incurred after Hurricane Ian, Utterback said.
The HCA hospital was shut down temporarily when Hurricane Ian struck Florida in late September.
Excluding one-off items, HCA reported a profit of $4.64 per share, below analysts’ average estimate of $4.78 per share.
(Reporting by Khushi Mandowara and Leroy Leo in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
