Publications

Dear Friends, Colleagues and Community Members,

I'm proud of the work we're doing, and I'm pleased to share this annual report with you. My family and I have enjoyed being part of this wonderful community for the past five years. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to serve as Chief Executive Officer of Beauregard Health System since January 2021.

Our community hospital has survived the most challenging two years imaginable. We've persevered through multiple waves of a pandemic, endured Hurricane Laura, weathered a winter ice storm, reorganized our leadership, and navigated vaccine distribution and mandates for employees. Even through these challenges, we have not deviated from our mission of providing exceptional care, right here at home.

In addition to the tremendous effort during the pandemic, our team has been working equally hard on many strategic and growth initiatives to strengthen our commitment to the long-term health care and wellness needs of our community. In an effort to keep physician led medical care in the community, we maintain and work an active recruitment strategy. Recruitment is prioritized based on medical staff input and in consideration of our triennial Community Health Needs Assessment, which provides a crucial perspective from the voice of our customers. Despite many distractions, we recruited two podiatrists and a general surgeon this year and have more specialists on the horizon. Additionally, we've partnered with Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM), a new medical school on the UL Monroe campus. Through this partnership, we will host medical students for their clinical rotations with our community physicians in order to reinforce their education while developing relationships in hopes of attracting these rural-focused students to our community long term. We've already signed a scholarship with a very promising VCOM student with an interest in Internal Medicine.

Mid-year in 2022, we're bringing comprehensive cardiovascular services to the community and will offer consultative, diagnostic and interventional care. With health care shifting from fee-for-service to value-based reimbursement, our focus on wellness, population health, outcomes and social determinants of health will continue to sharpen, through program support from our engagement with accountable care partners.

We continue to invest in our facility and community as well, as evidenced by our $4 million investment in the electronic health record and our $1 million renovation for a state-of-the-art infusion center on the second floor. In 2022 we expect to break ground on a brand-new Emergency Department, and we'll redesign vacant space on the third floor of the hospital for comprehensive women's health services. These two projects combined represent a $25 million investment.

The past two years have been anything but easy. I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to our entire team of health care heroes. Our team is dedicated and resilient, and we've worked tirelessly in service to our patients and community. On our journey of continuous improvement, I'm proud of where we are, excited about where we're going and thankful for our community's continued support.

Traci Thibodeaux, MHA, CMPE

Categories: From our CEO