Bill Murdock is looking to grow McDonough District Hospital in Macomb, and part of that could involve collaborations with competitors.
“It’s just a lot easier to build a business if you got two minds working together versus trying to work against each other to get that book of business,” said Murdock, who was named MDH’s president and CEO about a month ago.
He said MDH and other rural hospitals face many of the same challenges in recruiting employees and providing services. Technology might help address some of those issues.
“We’re looking at robotics right now. Robotics is a great recruiting tool for physicians,” Murdock said.
“If they’re looking to come here, they see you’ve got robotics, they’ve been trained on it, that’s a recruitment tool that we’re working on right now.”
He said MDH is also studying AI initiatives to help relieve labor shortages.
He said the hospital might look to acquire provider practices and services in McDonough County. He does not anticipate expanding outside of the county beyond the clinic MDH already operates in Monmouth.
Murdock, who served as MDH’s chief financial officer for five years, said the hospital has “a very strong balance sheet,” but added they’re working to improve its financial margins.
“The board just approved our budget for Fiscal Year ’25, and we’re projecting an operating loss for next year,” he said.
“We need a plan to mitigate those losses, so we’re bringing in our outside auditors to come in and do the margin improvement.”
In addition, hospital leadership is working on a financial stability plan.
He said the projected shortfall “is right around $3 million.”
The hospital’s new fiscal year begins Monday, July 1.
The change in leadership
Murdock served as MDH’s interim leader beginning late last year after the board suspended previous president and CEO Brian Dietz over employee complaints about a toxic work environment.
The board later reached a separation agreement with Dietz.
Murdock received a five-year contract to be president and CEO. His starting salary is $425,000.
Now that the “interim” tag has been removed from his title, Murdock said he can work on long-term ideas rather than simply striving to maintain the organization.
A big culture shift
Murdock said he’s striving to address employee concerns by being more transparent.
Murdock said the operations council, which consists of the hospital’s highest-ranking officials, is meeting weekly, and then sharing notes with all hospital employees so that they know what’s going on and how decisions are being made.
“Being visible with the staff brings trust,” Murdock said. “We’re doing a big culture shift here at the organization to get everybody passionate again about MDH and moving us forward.”
He praised the hospital staff, who he said supported and helped him during his time as interim president.
“I couldn’t ask for a better group,” he said.
Update on the new pharmacy building
Murdock said he did not initially support construction of a pharmacy building on the MDH campus, a project started by his predecessor. He considered it to be outside of the organization’s core mission.
But he has come around to view it as part of providing convenient care for patients.
“We want them to go to the clinic, see the doctor, go right out the clinic, go right to the pharmacy, get their prescriptions, and go home,” Murdock said.
He said the pharmacy will build on the convenience provided by the drive-through COVID testing and lab draw facility on the MDH campus.
Construction of the pharmacy building should be completed by mid-to-late July. It will then need to be inspected and certified by the state before the pharmacy can open, probably in mid-to-late fall.
Tri States Public Radio produced this story. TSPR relies on financial support from our readers and listeners in order to provide coverage of the issues that matter to west central Illinois, southeast Iowa, and northeast Missouri. As someone who values the content created by TSPR's news department please consider making a financial contribution.
