After Dimensions Healthcare Chief Executive Officer Dunlop Ecker said it had “approximately three to four days’ of cash on hand” three weeks ago, most of Prince George’s Hospital system’s vendors put it on a credit hold, according to a Dimensions official.
Suzanne Almalel, Dimensions vice president of public affairs and government relations, said the credit hold lasted from about April 10 to 18, when the county agreed to fund the system through June 2008. Dimensions runs the county-owned system.
“If it wasn’t announced that we were getting funding from another source, we would have been on [cash on delivery] and our cash would have been depleted, and our hospital would have naturally closed down because we didn’t have sufficient funds to keep the hospital going,” Almalel said.
Although the system still awaits a cash infusion, which the Prince George’s County said it would deliver by next week, it has managed to remain operational. Almalel said this was possible because the system has some supplies in stock, and it has cash coming in from its accounts receivable. Most vendors took Dimensions off cash on delivery following the funding pledge.
According to Almalel, Dimensions remains on cash on delivery with “four or five” vendors, but has been placed on credit watch with most of the others.
Under credit watch, Almalel said, “we still have the obligation, but [vendors] are not asking us to pay it in full.”
On April 9, before the conclusion of the General Assembly session, the Prince George’s County Council killed a deal with the state that would have saved the system.
The board of Dimensions was scheduled to vote April 18 to shut down the system or declare bankruptcy, but instead board Chairman Calvin Brown announced that Prince George’s agreed to fund the system through next June.
The county is reviewing cash-flow projections from Dimensions before determining how much it will provide and it expects to make a payment by next week.
