Universal Health Services Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Presentation

[Operator]

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Fourth Quarter 2023 Universal Health Services Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]

I would now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Steve Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Thank you, and good morning. Marc Miller is also joining us this morning, and we welcome you to this review of Universal Health Services results for the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2023. During the conference call, we'll be using words such as believes, expects, anticipates, estimates and similar words that represent forecasts, projections and forward-looking statements. For anyone not familiar with the risks and uncertainties inherent in these forward-looking statements, I recommend a careful reading of the section on risk factors and forward-looking statements and risk factors in our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2023.

We would like to highlight just a couple of developments and business trends before opening the call up to questions. As discussed in our press release last night, the company reported net income attributable to UHS per diluted share of $3.16 for the fourth quarter of 2023. After adjusting for the impact of the item reflected on the supplemental schedule, as included with the press release, our adjusted net income attributable to UHS per diluted share was $3.13 for the quarter ended December 31, 2023...

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

Our acute hospitals continue to experience strong demand for their services in the fourth quarter, with adjusted admissions increasing 5.6% year-over-year. Overall surgical volumes were solid as well, increasing 4% year-over-year. Net revenue per adjusted admission, which has lagged for much of the year, increased by 3.7% as compared to the fourth quarter of 2022, as acuity trends and pressure from payers have started to stabilize. Meanwhile, the amount of premium pay in the quarter, which declined from a peak of $153 million in the first quarter of 2022, was $67 million in the fourth quarter of 2023, similar to what it was in the third quarter.

For the full year 2023, our strong acute care revenues were largely offset by elevated expenses, especially physician subsidies which resulted in flattish margins for the full year. During the fourth quarter, same-facility revenues at our behavioral health hospitals increased by 7.2%, driven primarily by a 6.1% increase in revenue per adjusted patient day. The patient day growth in the quarter was greater at our acute behavioral hospitals versus our lower acuity residential treatment centers, which tended to drive up the revenue per day to relatively robust levels consistent with our year-to-date experience.

Additionally, as we discussed last quarter, we continue to see a negative impact of Medicaid redeterminations in certain states on behavioral health volumes, although it appears that impact has also begun to stabilize. With 8% revenue growth, same-facility EBITDA for our behavioral hospitals has increased approximately 9% for the full year of 2023 compared to 2022.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

We also note that in the fourth quarter, we recorded approximately $18 million in connection with the recently approved Mississippi Hospital Access Program covering the six-month period of July through December of 2023. Our cash generated from operating activities was $452 million during the fourth quarter of 2023 as compared to $297 million during the same quarter in 2022 and $1.268 billion during the full year of 2023 as compared to $996 million during 2022. We spent $743 million on capital expenditures during 2023, which was consistent with our original forecast for the year.

For the full year of 2023, we acquired $525 million of our own shares pursuant to our repurchase program. Since January 1, 2019, we have repurchased more than 26 million shares, representing almost 30% of our shares outstanding as of that date. As of December 31, 2023, we had $701 million of aggregate available borrowing capacity pursuant to our $1.2 billion revolving credit facility.

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

The core operating assumptions underlying our 2024 operating results forecast which was provided in last night's release, largely reflect the historical pre-COVID trends in their respective businesses. We anticipate that volumes in our acute segment will moderate from the elevated 2023 levels, but conversely, acuity and pricing in our acute business will increase, and for the full year, both metrics will resemble the patterns we experienced before the pandemic, despite the continuing shift of services from inpatient to outpatient settings and pressure from payers to restrain reimbursement increases in a variety of ways. We expect continued improvement in premium pay labor trends and general cost trends that will remain largely stable in 2024.

Specifically, physician expenses, which were a major headwind in 2023 are expected to grow by the overall inflation rate in 2024. As noted in our press release, our 2024 operating results forecast includes an additional $149 million $140 million of Nevada supplemental revenues, which were approved by CMS in late December and disclosed by us in an 8-K filed in early January. We believe demand for our behavioral services remains robust, and our same-store adjusted patient day growth in 2024 is forecasted to exceed the 2.1% growth we experienced in 2023.

A significant driver of behavioral volume upside is due to our success in filling vacant positions, but we acknowledge that specialty workforce shortages in certain markets, continue to be an obstacle to even more volume growth. In both our business segments, we were pleased that measures of patient satisfaction and quality of care increased in 2023, and we are focusing on continued improvement of these metrics in 2024. We are pleased to answer questions at this time.

Questions and Answers

[Operator]

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Ann Hynes with Mizuho. Please go ahead.

[Ann Hynes, Analyst at Mizuho]

Hi. Good morning. I want to ask you about the two midnight rule. I know that throughout the year, you had a lot of denials for these short-stay inpatient days. Does that get better in Q4? And do you actually think one of the large national managed care plans are saying they actually think hospitals might have built early and to start benefit in Q4?

Do you actually think that happened? Did you receive actually a benefit in Q4 from kind of early billings of this regulatory change that's starting in January 1, 2024? And also, can you tell me what your guidance includes for any potential benefit for this change for this and also for Medicaid redeterminations considering there's like a big growth in the health exchange market? And are you assuming any kind of positive payer mix shift benefit in guidance? Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. So as Marc commented in his prepared remarks, I think what we saw in Q4 was improved revenue per admission -- projected admission in the acute business, which I think we attribute to a combination of increasing acuity but also at least stabilizing pressure from payers. Again, I think we saw for much of 2024 -- for 2023 and payers being more aggressive as their medical loss ratios were rising, etc., in a variety of ways, including denials and patient status changes, which would include recasting patients from inpatient observation, etc.. I don't think we changed our billing practices during the quarter. But I think all you're seeing is effectively I think, we're starting to anniversary some of that more aggressive behavior of the payers in the fourth quarter.

As far as sort of how we guided, again, I think, as Marc said in his remarks, I think we're assuming that in the acuity segment, that volumes moderated a little bit in 2024 and that acuity pricing improves. So, we returned to kind of what I would consider to be a more historically normative model of mid-single-digit growth in acute care maybe 5%, 6% growth, split pretty evenly between price and volume. And I think what that really means is we're being a little conservative about volumes, which have sort of been running harder than that, but we're being a little bit more aggressive about pricing, which has been running less than that.

But it's not like we have included in our guidance a specific impact from sort of how payers will use the two midnight rule differently going forward, etc.. We believe there may be an incremental opportunity there but I don't think we necessarily feel it's material until we really see the behavior on the part of the payers change.

[Ann Hynes, Analyst at Mizuho]

Okay. Great. And just one follow-up. You talked about in your prepared remarks that the labor shortages are still impacting volume. Is this in both segments? Or is it mainly behavioral? And maybe how much do you think your volumes being held back because of labor?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. I mean, so as we've said, I think, throughout the last several years, it's been a very tight labor market, and I think it's affected the two businesses differently. On the acute side, we've generally been able to fill all of our necessary positions. But obviously, often at a higher cost using temporary label and traveling nurses, etc.. Although, as we indicated in our prepared remarks, those numbers have declined significantly.

On the acute side -- excuse me, on the behavioral side, in contrast, in a number of cases, we're simply unable to fill our positions over the last several years, and it has curtailed our volume growth. Again, I think our basic guidance for next year is mid-single-digit growth probably in the behavioral segment, that means 6%, 7%, 8%, again, split pretty evenly between price and volume.

In the behavioral segment, I think that means we're being a little bit more conservative about price which has been running hot the last couple of years and a little bit more aggressive about volume, which has been relatively soft this year. I think Marc said, our patient day growth in 2023 was 2.1%. So our guidance assumes something greater than that. But we acknowledge that in some markets, in some hospitals, there are positions that we still have difficulty filling I don't know that we can say precisely, but we do think that we could run higher volumes if, in fact, we could fill all of our positions, but we know that's not a realistic outlook at the moment, at least.

[Ann Hynes, Analyst at Mizuho]

Great. Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Justin Lake with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

[Justin Lake, Analyst at Wolfe Research]

Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to ask you first about the 2024 guide. The -- specifically -- the Nevada ends up at the high end of the range you gave before, obviously, a great tailwind. Ex that, it looks like EBITDA growth at the midpoint in the 4% range, Steve. Just trying to understand, I think the -- we're probably only -- we're splitting hairs a little bit, maybe expected 1%, 2% better than ex-Nevada. Just curious if there were any kind of one-timers in 2023 where it's not really apples-to-apples that you want to point out? Or anything within the guidance, for instance, Marc mentioned a tough comp on -- on inpatient. Like maybe you could tell us what you think the EBITDA by business is going to grow? And any thoughts on why that's maybe 1% or 2% shorter than kind of typical?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. So first of all, Justin, I mean I think that there is a series of arguments that we made that excluding the increase in Nevada or quite frankly, excluding any of our Medicaid supplemental payments is really an appropriate way to look at the business because I think what we would argue quite strenuously, is that one of the reasons -- one of the significant reasons that our margins and earnings have lagged over the last several years is that Medicaid reimbursement, in particular, has not kicked up with elevated costs, whether that's the labor costs across both businesses or the physician subsidy expense that Marc referenced in the acute business in his remarks.

So in our minds, the amount of increase specifically but these Medicaid supplemental programs in general are simply bringing us back to adequate rates that at least partially compensate us for some of these increased expenses. So in my mind, ignoring them, as we think about our growth year-to-year, is not necessarily the correct way of doing it. But I'll try and answer your question the way you asked it. What I would say is, I do believe that after a couple of difficult years and difficult operating environments and elevated costs, again, in labor, physician costs, just general inflation sort of across the board, we've been a little bit cautious about our ability to expand margins.

I would say that if we're able to achieve the revenue targets that we've set in our guidance, we'd be hopeful that we could do better than the margins that are embedded in guidance. But as we faced over the last several years, some of these expense increases have been a bit unpredictable, physician subsidies in 2023 are a perfect example. So I think we've been prudently cautious about how we look at the profitability growth in both businesses.

[Justin Lake, Analyst at Wolfe Research]

That's helpful. And then, Steve, as you mentioned on DPP, and I don't disagree that it's lumpy, but it should be part of the business. That said, it's gone to a place I never imagined to go in the supplemental payments. And I'm just curious, like you guys actually put out a great table in the 10-K, where you actually showed us the estimated number for 2024. And I'm just sitting here looking over time, Steve.

I think in 2019, it was $225 million of net benefit or 13% of EBITDA. Now it's an $809 million benefit or 41% of your EBITDA guidance in 2024. And I'm just curious, like do you think this continues -- like do you see any states that could be the next Nevada? Or do you see the potential that this starts to moderate at some point or kind of stabilize because it's obviously been a big part of growth over the last couple of years. Just curious how you think about it going forward. Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. So look, I think you make a good point. I mean, I think if you look -- and I appreciate your commenting on our disclosures because I think we've provided probably more expansive disclosures in this area of Medicaid supplemental payments than any of our public peers. But if you go back, however many years you want to track it, it has, as you've suggested, an upward trajectory. And that's not by accident. I mean I think it's an acknowledgment by the states and by CMS that Medicaid reimbursement, again, in specific space, has really been inadequate and has really been inadequate over the last several years and an elevated inflationary environment with significant expense pressures, particularly in labor.

And the states are providing these monies not as bonuses for hospital providers. But quite frankly, as necessary supplemental reimbursement to keep them in a position -- to keep the providers in a position to be able to provide absolutely necessary services to a population that otherwise, will not receive them. So quite honestly, there are other states that do not have these programs that are talking about adopting them. We don't really disclose them until they get further down the road and sort of our submitted for approval and that sort of thing. But we know that conversations are happening in a number of other states. CMS, to your point, has certainly talked about the impact of the growth in these programs.

And as talked about, I think limiting the growth. I don't think they're really talking about cutting back these programs, but they're talking about capping the growth, maybe capping the growth at so that Medicaid reimbursement can exceed commercial reimbursement. I don't think we're at risk of that in any of our states, or just capping the overall growth rate, etc.. So I could see that happening where the rate of growth slows, but it strikes me that once these programs are implemented, the safety net hospitals that they are really designed to target become so reliant on them that it would be extremely difficult for the state and/or CMS to stop the programs or curtail them in a terribly material way.

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

I think that's the main point that it's going to be hard to go backwards because of this safety net, not-for-profit hospitals that rely on this. And so the crux of your question as to whether or not you can bank on this in the future, we never know. But I think it's going to be hard for them to reverse a lot of this. And in fact, to Steve's point, we're seeing a lot more activity in other states that we had never seen before. So we think it's going to increase.

[Justin Lake, Analyst at Wolfe Research]

Thanks guys.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Joshua Raskin with Nephron Research. Please go ahead.

[Joshua Raskin, Analyst at Nephron Research]

Hi, thanks. Good morning. Question, just start looking at the longer term, as you think about capital deployment, I'd be interested in your updated views on the relative attractiveness of the behavioral health in the acute care segment and specifically thinking, whether you believe either one of those segments has either a different growth or return profile, one more attractive than the other?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. I mean, obviously, anyone who looks at our financials, you can see that we are in a higher margin in the behavioral business, I think, probably higher returns. But I think we've always viewed our opportunities for capital deployment agnostically in the sense that we want to invest our next dollar of capital wherever we think it's going to earn the highest return. And that's not just about, which line of business, but it's about the individual market opportunity. Las Vegas is a great example. We've invested a tremendous amount of capital, hundreds of millions of dollars of capital over the last decade or more in Las Vegas.

And I think for the most part, it has earned a significantly outsized return. We are not about to stop investing in that market, and protecting our number one market share position in that market, etc.. So our capital deployment decisions are, I think, made, as I said, market by market, in terms of the demographics of the market, the competitive environment. And, obviously, as I think we commented in our remarks as well, significant amount of capital has been devoted over the last five or six years to share repurchase because we think that, that's been a compelling return and opportunity for us, and we'll continue to look at that as well.

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

I'll just add one thing to what Steve said. We're looking - and I obviously agree with everything Steve said. But we're looking at more outpatient opportunities now than we probably have done in the past. And so I think more of them are being presented to us. And again, if we think that there are good returns there and then it makes sense for increasing our success in our markets, we'll continue to look at those and deploy more capital to outpatient, maybe at a greater percentage than we did historically.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

In both sectors.

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

In both sectors.

[Joshua Raskin, Analyst at Nephron Research]

Right. So that makes sense. And so in theory, those are margin accretive. Those are certainly return accretive but margin accretive, I guess, depending on though, if there's more opportunities maybe in the acute care segment in the short-term, maybe that's not the case. But I guess my follow-up would be, I'm curious about the current environment for additional supply then. Are you seeing any major capital deployed in your markets by competitors? And I guess, conversely, sort of that Vegas example, what markets do you think are in need of more supply?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. I mean so we -- as you know, are opening a new hospital in Las Vegas late in 2024 in West Henderson, that's on the heels of opening Henderson Hospital five years ago, if I'm getting my chronology correct. That's been a very significant success. We've continued to expand our presence in South Texas and Riverside County, California, where we have significant market positions. We're building a new hospital in Palm Beach Garden Florida. And one in the D.C. market, where we had a significant amount of historical success. So -- and then on the behavioral side, we continue to add beds and do joint ventures with non-hospital - non-profit hospital partners.

So again, I think there are lots of opportunities. I think the challenge for us is to be judicious about where we do that. And to your point, Joshua, I mean, I think our competitors are also investing in markets. I think HCA has invested heavily in Las Vegas as well because it has been a very lucrative return market for both of us. So we see that. It really varies by market. It would be difficult to characterize the sort of capital deployment of our competitors in a broad way. But yes, we certainly see our competitors expanding as well. And again, our whole sort of view is we don't want to chase what our competitors are doing. We want to really take advantage of the strong franchise positions that we have and build on those and earn greater returns by investing where we've had success.

[Joshua Raskin, Analyst at Nephron Research]

Very helpful. Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Stephen Baxter with Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

[Stephen Baxter, Analyst at Wells Fargo & Company]

Hi. Thanks. Two quick ones on the EQ business. I guess, good to hear the position expenses that you seem to think the worst of the inflation is behind you there. I was wondering if you could comment a little bit on how -- or what level of contracting visibility you have on 2024 in particular. And then just a kind of a step back on the acute business, there's been a lot of focus on portfolio management at a couple of your peer companies, a couple of examples of significant value creation.

Was wondering how you think about the size of the acute care business philosophically and whether there could be examples potentially whether you've seen in the increase in inbound interest on the acute side? I would love to just hear kind of how you guys are thinking about that as you contemplate capital across the company. Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. I think that the notion of contracting visibility in terms of the physician subsidy expense is a little bit flawed. The reality is, 18 months ago, if you had asked us and asked, frankly, any acute care hospital in the country, are your hospital-based physician contracts locked in, you have rates locked in? The answer would have been, yes. And what we found were because of changes in the operating environment, in particular, the no surprise billing act, etc. that made those businesses far less profitable. The providers in those businesses, the physician groups, the companies that we're providing those services simply were unable to do it.

And they were coming to hospitals and saying, "Look, you either have to provide us greater subsidies or we can't do this." There were a number of bankruptcies, etc.. So what I will say is I believe that over the last 1.5 years, most of our hospital-based physician arrangements have been recast. They've either been renegotiating with the incumbent providers. We've either gone after RFPs and put in new providers or we've employed in some cases, the physicians ourselves.

We've done so, I think really beginning late in 2022 and early in 2023 such that the increased cost of doing all that is now largely reflected in our financial statements, and it shouldn't increase again dramatically in 2024. But I will say, again, back to the comments that I made in response to a question that Justin asked, I do think that the volatility in that area is one of the reasons why we've been a little more cautious in our overall guidance in 2024, because I think all hospitals would say that was a cost that really surprised us in 2023. We think we have it under control. We think it's much more stable going into 2024. But we're certainly concerned about that popping again or happening again in some other areas.

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

Sure. As to your second question about the portfolio and acute care opportunities, we track very carefully all the companies, familiar with what you're referring to the question of portfolio rationalization for some of those other companies out there, we are most interested in what we can do in our current acute care markets. So if there are opportunities to pick up other hospitals that are within markets that we are already present, we would certainly look to do that. But in addition to that, we are familiar with the whole portfolios of these companies. And if there were opportunities to expand into new markets that we thought made sense, we would do that as well. Like Steve said earlier, we're kind of agnostic as to which side we deploy capital to, but if there are opportunities, we'll certainly pursue them.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

And I know your question was not directed at the behavioral business, but I would make the point that we've done quite a bit of portfolio management in the behavioral business over the last five or 10 years. If somebody wants to take our 10-K list of properties from 10 years ago, behavioral properties and compare them to today, you can see that they're quite different. We've closed facilities. We've sold facilities, we merge facilities, where they're underperforming and where we're looking to increased efficiencies. We tend not to disclose that because individual transactions are not material. But there has been a fair amount of portfolio management on the behavioral side. And then again, we're open to that. I think we're ready for the next question.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Kevin Fischbeck with Bank of America. Please go ahead.

[Kevin Fischbeck, Analyst at Bank of America]

Great. Just wondering if you could give us an update on where wage growth is across both the acute and the psych businesses today? And to the extent that labor is still a gating factor on the psych side of things. How do you think about the incremental return of just raising wages a couple of percent to potentially drive more volume back to the facilities? Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. I would say that wage growth has moderated a little bit from its highs in both segments. I think we're probably in that 4% to 5% range of annual wage inflation. And obviously, we've made is, again, I think we said in our prepared remarks, a fair amount of progress in reducing premium pay, which includes temporary traveling labor and overtime and shift differential that sort of thing. And -- I'm sorry, one second...

[Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer at Universal Health Services]

No the question is we look quite often as to whether or not it makes sense to raise wages as a way to increased capacity. And we have done that in certain areas. It's not as easy as one might think, but we definitely look at that, and we try to figure out if there are areas that would make more sense. The other factor for us is we have high occupancy in a lot of these facilities. So we're constantly looking and reviewing ways that we cannot bet for the facilities to increase capacity.

And one of the things that Steve talks about the portfolio rationalization that we've done on the behavioral side in the last few years. What that also allows us to do is spend less time on facilities that are not growing and really spend more of our time figuring out how to do programmatic growth, not just beds, but just changing program offerings at certain facilities and changes like that, that we think will have a positive effect. So we're doing a lot of that as well.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

But I would just add, I think, Kevin, what to under, you're asking, do we think about the efficacy of paying increased wages to attract that last 1% or 2% of the workforce that would help us increase our volumes. And that's really the why -- when and why we use temporary labor because the challenge is if we hire somebody for that last position last two or three positions in the facility, and they're making $5 an hour more than everybody else in the facility. In short order, everybody in the facility will be making that same wage. So that's the consideration we have to use. We certainly acknowledge that we want to fill every position we can, but we understand that there are implications to paying up to do that.

[Kevin Fischbeck, Analyst at Bank of America]

Okay. Great. And then I guess I just want to maybe push back a little bit on the guidance for acute care hospital volume growth kind of just being more pre-pandemic growth rates of 2% or 3%. I guess when I look at your same-store volume growth going back to 2019 and just trying to get forward, I think you're only like about 4% above where you were in 2019, five years later, when you would normally be thinking you'd be growing 2% or 3%. So you're still -- in 2019, we might have thought your volumes would be 10% or 15% above those levels. So why is normal growth off of only 4% up like the right number? Shouldn't there be more heads up demand or normalization in demand within your markets why only normal growth?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. I mean again, though, and particularly the comparison that you're talking about, Kevin, I think it's wholly inappropriate to exclude the $150 million of Nevada supplemental from a comparison to 2019 because I think what we would say in Nevada is we've had virtually no Medicaid increases for this period of time. And as a result, and we've been questions about this, our margins in Nevada have declined, etc.. So to then say that we're going to exclude the $150 million from comparing where we were margin-wise to 2019.

Again, I think it's a flawed approach. And again, that's not to say we believe that even with the supplemental payments, etc., there is still more growth to go in the acute division and more recovery to be had to get closer to those pre-pandemic margins. But I think excluding the supplemental payments from that is a flawed way of looking at it.

[Kevin Fischbeck, Analyst at Bank of America]

Sorry, my question was kind of more around the volumes. It feels like to me like your volume guidance it feels like your volumes haven't really rebounded to the long-term trend line yet. So I'm still not sure why you're only growing normal, wouldn't you still be trending back to the long-term growth rate in volume? Shouldn't you be growing faster then two to three for another couple of years?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

I mean our adjusted admissions in 2023 grew by 5%, or I think actually over 6% for the year. Honestly, I think those are historically high level of admission growth, we're projecting that at some point, that starts to moderate.

[Kevin Fischbeck, Analyst at Bank of America]

Okay. All right. Thanks.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Jason Cassorla with Citi. Please go ahead.

[Jason Cassorla, Analyst at Smith Barney Citigroup]

Great. Thanks. Good morning. I just wanted to ask on behavioral. You talked in the past around the labor backdrop as the gating factor for bed growth, you've discussed the portfolio rationalization efforts. I guess, occupancy rates are still some 200 to 300 basis points below pre-pandemic levels with labor improvement, I know you're expecting volume growth to accelerate in 2024. Can you just give us a sense on what you're contemplating on the behavioral bed growth side moving forward? And maybe just the opportunities a little bit more around that expansion at current facilities against maybe perhaps the pipeline of JVs or potential M&A for behavioral business as well? Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. I mean, so I think we added somewhere around 250 new beds in behavioral this year. We will probably add like numbers, so maybe a little bit more next year. But I think the comment that Marc made is I think we're seeing, frankly, just as much opportunity on the outpatient side as well. So we are expanding and expanding our existing outpatient services across all lines of services, including addiction treatment, etc., and plan to continue to do that as well. I think as past we mention about kind of a higher returning, higher margin business. So that's attracting more of, I think, our investment dollars there.

[Jason Cassorla, Analyst at Smith Barney Citigroup]

Okay. Fair enough. And then, just following up on an earlier question a bit, just curious on what your expectation around payer mix dynamics are for next year? Obviously, redeterminations exchange growth. And you've talked about this return of low acuity of Medicare volume in 2023, just any kind of expectation around how that trends into next year or into 2024? And then can you remind us what percentages of admissions are uninsured at this point? And if -- just given the backdrop if you're seeing any indication that those uninsured admissions could be picking up, just any color there would be great. Thanks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

No. We haven't seen a significant change in uninsured admissions, which run in sort of the mid-single digits, 5% to 6% of our overall admissions. I think what -- the big change in dynamic which I think a number of both the providers and payers have talked about in 2023 is that, as we've emerged from the pandemic, I think we've seen more of those lower acuity, I think, especially Medicare, lower acuity procedures that patients had deferred or postponed during the pandemic taking place.

And again, as our volumes moderate going forward and they have been moderating, not just for us but all for our peers as well in 2023. I think it goes lower acuity volumes that especially are moderating, which I think would agree is what's driving the increase, let's say, in the fourth quarter in our acuity and pricing dynamic.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for next question. Our next question comes from A.J. Rice with UBS. Please go ahead.

[A.J. Rice, Analyst at UBS Group]

Hi, everybody. Maybe just to comment on premium pay first. I think you said you started the year at $153 million in the first quarter and you were $67 million as you exited the year. Do you think the $67 million is a good run rate? Is there further opportunity? And putting it all together, how much of a tailwind do you have from reduced premium pay 2024 versus 2023?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. So just to clarify, A.J., the $153 million was the first quarter of 2022, not 2023. And -- so yes, that -- obviously, that number has come down considerably. I think we still think that there is -- we ultimately have talked about getting to a premium pay number in the sort of $50 million quarter range. So there's still $50 million or $60 million of opportunity.

A lot of that is dependent on what happens to volumes. I think that premium pay has remained a little bit higher than we originally anticipated because acute volumes have been as strong as they've been. But yes, I mean, we certainly have the goal of further reducing premium pay. I'm not sure we're going to get back to the pre-pandemic levels where we were around about $35 million a quarter, but we should be able to get at least part of the way there.

[A.J. Rice, Analyst at UBS Group]

And I don't have the full year number for premium pay, but how much have you just stayed at $67 million, how much of a tailwind would that create 2024 versus 2023? Do you have that number by any chance?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. So I think that would probably -- I'm going off the top of my head A.J., but I think that would probably on its own would be like a $30 million, $40 million improvement. Because I think in the first half of the year, we were running about $85 million a quarter.

[A.J. Rice, Analyst at UBS Group]

Okay. And then my follow-up question, just ask a little bit more on Medicaid, both from the supplemental and the redeterminations. On the supplemental, I know we've talked about individual programs. When you put it all together, what you got in 2023 versus what you're expecting in 2024, how much of a change is -- I guess it could be gross or net after provider tax just trying to understand that. And then you mentioned, I think, in the press release or in the 10-K that Medicaid redeterminations were a headwind for the behavioral business. I'm just wondering if you close that out a little bit more.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. So I think somebody earlier had suggest that, I mean, we gave some pretty robust disclosure that the Medicaid supplemental programs in the 10-K that we filed last night. I'd refer people to that. But we have a table that shows the supplemental increase from 2023 to estimated 2024, it's about a $200 million increase. Obviously, the $150 million of a lot is the biggest piece of that. But you can see a lot of the detail if you take a look at that schedule.

And as far as Medicaid redeterminations, I think what we've said, A.J., is that in the states, which probably is most notably Texas on the acute side, and some other Texas and some other Southern places like Louisiana and Arkansas on the behavioral side, it's largely affected the child adolescent population from our perspective, and that had a relatively minimal effect on the acute business. bigger effect on the behavioral business. We've seen a softness, I think, in the last six months of 2023 in our business in our child and adolescent business in the behavioral business that we attribute to a large extent to these redeterminations.

We think we're sort of out of the worst of that. The redetermination for the most part are the disenrollments have taken place, we're already starting to see some of these -- some of this population reenrolled either in Medicaid or alternative programs like chip or in commercial exchange programs. So I think that we're imagining that the impact of redeterminations in 2024 will be limited.

[A.J. Rice, Analyst at UBS Group]

Okay. All right. Thanks a lot.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Pito Chickering with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.

[Pito Chickering, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

Hey, good morning, guys. On behavioral, I think for 2024 guidance, I think half of the revenue guidance is coming from pricing. Pricing for behavioral has been very robust in the last few years. Can you talk about the sustainability of that strong pricing you've seen looking at the exit rate in fourth quarter? How we should think about a step down in 2024? And then any color on sort of what you're seeing between the different payer mixes managed care rate increases versus Medicaid and Medicare, that would be great.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Sure, Peter. So again, I think as we commented, the strong behavioral pricing, I think, has really been driven in 2023 by two things. One is actual sort of softness in our residential, and that's where a lot of the child and adolescent business is. And so the higher weighting of acute patient days to residential patient days and that, by definition, sort of increases what we would describe as pricing or revenue per adjusted day. As we emerge from the disenrollment challenge as we emerge from the handful of residential facilities that had particular regulatory challenges, in 2023, I think we'll see residential growth starting to outpace acute growth, and that will have a kind of a muting effect on pricing.

The other issue that we have talked about pretty consistently, I think for the last 12 or 18 months is a pretty aggressive effort on our part to go back to payers, particularly in markets and in facilities where we are already capacity constrained and negotiate higher rates. And that's, I think, particularly managed Medicaid payers who have been giving us, I think, historically, less than adequate increases. We've had a lot of success doing that, but to some degree, we're starting to anniversary that impact. So again, while we are certainly going to continue to strive for the maximum increases we can get from our payers, our general sense of our 2024 budget is that pricing and acuity will decline a little bit on the behavioral side, but the offset by increased volumes.

[Pito Chickering, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

Okay. Great. And then on a key margin guidance for 2024, it sounds like physician reimbursement is now just slightly over inflation. Full-time labor is normal. Contract labor is a $30 million, $40 million savings guiding to flat margins despite revenues growing 5% to 6%. Are there any known headwinds for 2024 to offset sort of all these tailwinds? Or is this simply just pure conservative at this point?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. Again, as I think I tried to frame it before, Peter, I think it is kind of a broad caution and conservatism that we've taken but informed by the pressures of the last couple of years, when we were sitting here in -- a good example is the physician expense. When we were on this exact call a year ago, we were projecting a pretty big increase in position expense, a $50 million, $60 million increase. It turned out to be twice that. So even when we're aware of issues, etc., the last couple of years have created a little bit more volatility than were accustomed to. So I think we were trying to account for some of that in what I view as a fairly cautious approach to guidance.

[Pito Chickering, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

So let me ask it differently, ignoring the $30 million, $40 million contract savings and assuming nothing normal labor, etc., etc., on a 5% to 6% revenue growth, what would be the normal margin expansion coming from that?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. So I think that's a hard question to answer, Pito, because it's sort of how you define normal, we're in a high inflationary environment, etc.. I'll just repeat what I said before. I believe our view is if we can achieve the revenue target better than in our guidance, we'd be hopeful to bringing out more efficiencies and therefore, higher margin from the business than are currently reflected in the guidance.

[Pito Chickering, Analyst at Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft]

Great. Thanks so much.

[Operator]

Thank you. One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Whit Mayo with Leerink Partners. Please go ahead.

[Whit Mayo, Analyst at Leerink Partners]

Hi, thanks. First, Steve, I just wanted to point out that you have also considerably exceeded those initial Medicaid supplemental payment disclosures in your 10-K every year, I can recall. So I just wanted to mention that for the record, but my -- my question really on a Medicaid there's been a theme for years now where many states have gotten workaround solutions to the IMD where Medicaid is now covering adults that actually have substance use disorders through 11, 15 waivers. I'm just wondering if there's any evidence that you see that those policy actions are now manifesting into any volume growth for you?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. I mean there are a couple of individual facilities in markets that I think has been affected by IMD waivers. I would say that broadly, it has had probably not a material effect on the segment. But there are specific examples I could point to. But yes, no, I wouldn't say it's broadly a material impact.

[Whit Mayo, Analyst at Leerink Partners]

Okay. And back to your comments on outpatient now elevating itself as a higher priority. Now that Medicare's reimbursing for IOP and partial hospitalization programs. Just wondering if that opens up obvious opportunities for you if that's what you're referencing when you talk about outpatient for behavioral.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yes. I mean, really, I think is the full continuum. We have always had what we call intensive outpatient programs in our vasculitis or partial hospitalization which are sort of a means of step down from the inpatient facility. But I think what we're focusing now on besides those programs, which we continue to maintain is more sort of pure outpatient, in many cases, not necessarily even affiliated with an existing facility, etc., but stand-alone outpatient. And to your point, it's the Medicare Advantage, it's the Medicare opportunity. But it's also -- again, we're finding the need for behavioral care to be growing across all segments of the population and across all diagnosis, including addiction and others.

[Whit Mayo, Analyst at Leerink Partners]

Yes. Thanks.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Sarah James with Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

[Sarah James, Analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald]

Thank you. So earlier, your comments on pricing about being a little bit below the halfway point of the 5% to 6%. I'm assuming that was blended products. Could you speak to what you're seeing on the commercial rate increase side? Because some of your peers are talking about kind of mid-single digits on that and seeing a little bit of traction of being able to work in the physician fees. So I'm wondering what that's looking like for you guys on the acute side?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. I think those characterizations are fair. So if we're talking about overall an overall pricing assumption in our guidance of 2.5% to 3%. We're probably getting twice that on our commercial business, so 5%, 6%. And in terms of -- specifics about whether we're able to cover increases in our physician offices, that really varies contract-by-contract, etc.. But the mid-single-digit commercial increases that, you're saying or peers are sitting seems to be consistent with the life experience.

[Sarah James, Analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald]

Great. And one more just on what you guys are doing on technology investments on the acute and behavioral side. Are you implementing any sort of virtual bed checks on either of those segments? Or where would you focus your technology investment?

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. So I would highlight. I mean, we have a lot of technology investment, but I think specifically, in behavioral. And we talked about this before we are implementing an electronic medical record in our behavioral facility. That project is already underway. We are experimenting with and testing a number of technological solutions to more efficient paper, patient rounding in our behavioral facilities where patients will wear something like an Apple Watch kind of device. And we're able to track their location and we're able to track when we lay eyes on those patients, etc.. So that's improving the efficiency of our patient rounding in order to able to save as well.

[Sarah James, Analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald]

Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. I'm showing no further questions at this time. I'd now like to turn it back to Steve Filton, for closing remarks.

[Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Universal Health Services]

Yeah. We'd just like to thank everybody for their time this morning and look forward to speaking to everybody in a couple months after the first quarter. Thank you.

[Operator]

[Operator Closing Remarks]

Participants

Corporate Executives

• Steve G. Filton, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
• Marc D. Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer

Analysts

• Ann Hynes, Mizuho
• Justin Lake, Wolfe Research
• Joshua Raskin, Nephron Research
• Stephen Baxter, Wells Fargo & Company
• Kevin Fischbeck, Bank of America Co.
• Jason Cassorla, Smith Barney Citigroup
• A.J. Rice, UBS Group AG
• Pito Chickering, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft
• Whit Mayo, Leerink Partners
• Sarah James, Cantor Fitzgerald