Pediatrix Medical Group, Inc. (NYSE:MD) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

AJ Rice: Okay. And then maybe my last one, you called out well, two expense items. I see €“ I think in a quarter a little step up in malpractice. I wondered if that was just a normal year-end true up, or is there anything else going on there? And then the incremental labor that’s been taken on to deal with the revenue cycle management issue, is that on your books, is that going to continue to be on your books or is that part of as well as getting the revenues right, but part of why the outlook improves in the back half the year that some of that will go away?

Mark Ordan: Hey, AJ, it’s Mark. With respect to the incremental staffing efforts that, that both we and our RCM vendor have made, some of that additional cost is will be borne by us and some of it will be borne by the vendor.

AJ Rice: Okay. And does that fade out at some point or is that a permanent step up on labor?

Mark Ordan: I’d say that remains unknown at this point.

AJ Rice: Okay. And then on your malpractice comment, anything there?

Mark Ordan: With respect to the spike in the fourth quarter, this is really related to normal year-end activity and settlements related to that activity.

AJ Rice: Okay. All right. Thanks.

Operator: And next we’ll go to Pito Chickering with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.

Pito Chickering: Yes. Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Just a follow-up to AJ’s questions there. You talked about making sure that your commercial payers are following proper rules for the No Surprise Act. I guess a couple questions here. What percent of our commercial cases are going to arbitration? Is your win ratio still 75%? And can you quantify the revenues loss in this case is? What the revenue contraction was in this case is?

Mark Ordan: Yes, I think from our standpoint, well, one thing on the IDR process, we feel that we have a very robust process for the claims that we submit. It’s a very small number of claims that we’ve entered into that process. And I would say that we’ve been largely successful in doing that. We’ve won over 80% of the time with our packet that’s submitted in the IDR. So we’re fairly confident and we think that sends a message to the payers by the way that they see €“ with that success rate that they’re going to move to have us come back in network. So I think, again, we’ve been largely successful there.

Pito Chickering: Okay. Second question on the transformational costs here, they spiked to almost $20 million in the fourth quarter. That’s a pretty big jump versus we haven’t seen at the level since 2020. We’re doing all the consulting fees. So can you give us details of what was in that number and what you assume for transformational cost for 2023?

Marc Richards: Sure. It’s Marc Richards again. That number represented exit costs associated with those executives that were terminated at the end of the year. There were a significant amount of executives in that pool, and going into 2023, we do not expect any transition in restructuring expenses.

Pito Chickering: Okay, great. And then last question here, just you looking at the net leverage ratio is 2.6. With EBITDA sort of flattish or down the last couple years. What’s the right leverage that ESB running at? And does this €“ does the leverage ratios on the 2023 EBITDA guidance or change how you look at acquisitions for next year? Thanks.

Marc Richards: No, I don’t think so. We’ve said in the past that we’re very comfortable in the three times range. Certainly, our leverage will move from quarter-to-quarter as we make draws on our credit facility. But I would say, as a general rule of thumb, we like three times.