Christopher Hunter
Analyst · Credit Suisse. Please go ahead
Thank you, Gretchen. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for being with us today for our third quarter 2022 conference call. I'm here today with our Chief Financial Officer, David Duckworth, and other members of our executive management team. David and I will provide some remarks about our financial and operating performance for the third quarter of 2022 and then following our comments, we will open the line for your questions. Looking back at the third quarter, the strong momentum continued in our business, reflecting robust demand for our behavioral healthcare services. We executed our strategy with favorable results across our key performance metrics. Our same facility revenue increased 10.2% compared with the third quarter of 2021, including an increase in revenue per patient day of 6.9% and an increase in patient days of 3.1%. We continue to experience positive trends in revenue per patient day as we have seen throughout 2022. Our revenue per patient day growth continues to reflect the value of the services we provide and our strong payer relationships, with rate increases received across many of our payers, geographic markets and service lines. Demand for our services continues to grow and we believe we are well positioned to maintain our strong growth trajectory. Without question, the critical need for behavioral health treatment has become a primary focus for health officials, medical professionals and lawmakers across the country, further amplified by the added strains of the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent data last month from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention showed the US suicide rate rose 4% in 2021 after two consecutive years of declines, highlighting the critical need for early assessment and intervention. As a leading provider of behavioral healthcare services, we play a vital role in addressing this need and we're fortunate to have an experienced and dedicated team of employees and clinicians across our operations who have worked tirelessly to meet the needs of those seeking treatment for mental health and substance use issues. They’ve navigated through the challenges of a tight labor market while seeking stability and our labor supply and cost. We have progressed on our key growth initiatives across all of our service lines this year. Acadia has a well-defined strategy for sustained long-term growth through four distinct pathways to expand our market reach. I will briefly update you on our accomplishments across these four pathways during the third quarter. Facility expansions remain the first and most efficient growth pathway as we can expand services and establish markets with our existing infrastructure and experienced staff. In the third quarter, we added 132 beds to our existing facilities and expect to add another approximately 90 beds in the fourth quarter. In the second half of 2022, we will be adding over 200 beds to our existing facilities, which are needed to meet the demand in our existing markets and will continue to support future growth. Additionally, we're on track to meet our goal of adding approximately 300 beds and new programs in calendar 2022. For our second growth pathway, we continue to develop wholly owned de-novo facilities that meet the critical demand for behavioral healthcare services in underserved markets. There are significant opportunities across the country to address this unmet need at the local community level. We opened a 60-bed children's hospital in early July as the first stage of our mantra's behavioral health hospital operations in Chicago. In addition to the children's hospital, we expect to begin operations at the 101-bed adult hospital in the outpatient facility in 2023, following the renovations of these facilities. We also continue to identify opportunities to expand our network of comprehensive treatment centers or CTCs to address the critical need for addiction treatment, specifically for patients dealing with opioid-used disorder. During the third quarter, we opened new CTCs in Indiana and Florida, bringing our total to four CTCs open this year. We expect to meet our objective to open at least six new CTCs in 2022. Our third growth pathway is strategic partnerships with leading health systems across the country. We are proud to work with a growing number of premier health systems to expand behavioral healthcare treatment options in their respective communities. By working together, we leverage our behavioral health expertise and implement best practices to deliver high quality care and positive clinical outcomes for more patients. During the third quarter, we opened a new fifth quarter, we opened a new facility with our joint venture partner, Covenant Health in Knoxville, Tennessee. We also broke ground on a new state-of-the-art behavioral health treatment in teaching hospital with our joint venture partner Henry Ford Health in the Detroit, Michigan metropolitan area. An important aspect of many of our joint venture partnerships is the academic focus in training of future clinicians. During the third quarter, our Belmont Behavioral Health Hospital in Philadelphia entered into a formal Affiliation Agreement with Thomas Jefferson University's, Sydney Kimmel Medical College in Jefferson Health in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to further teaching and clinical care opportunities for students in behavioral healthcare. With our now 18 joint venture partners across the country and a solid pipeline of potential new partners, we expect this pathway to continue to be a strong driver of our growth. We are excited about the opportunities to extend our market reach with a shared commitment with our joint venture partners to address the critical demand for behavioral healthcare services. Our fourth pathway focuses on identifying strategic acquisition opportunities to grow our scale and expertise through investments and expansion and service offerings to further enhance our continuum of care. We are fortunate to have a strong balance sheet that supports our ability to pursue acquisitions along with opportunities through our other important growth pathways. So in conclusion, we are well-positioned to build upon our strong growth trajectory and meet our previously stated development targets for the year, which are adding approximately 600 beds in 2022 through approximately 300 bed editions to existing facilities, opening one inpatient de novo, two facilities with JB Partners and at least six CTC locations. Before I turn the call over to David, I would like to highlight three new leadership appointments to Acadia. These leaders join a strong leadership team and will bring additional expertise in growth areas for the company. As we announced in September, Dr. Nasser Khan has been named Operations Group President of our CTC business in its growing network of 144 facilities. Nasser joins Acadia with experience as a medical doctor and an operational leader for a large healthcare system. His experience in process improvement, innovative patient care and network expansion will serve this business line well in the years to come. Secondly, Bill Priest was named Chief Compliance Officer in October. Bill will oversee the compliance function for Acadia, working with the team to oversee programs and standards that further our strategy and meet key performance measures, ensuring that Acadia maintains the highest industry standards. Bill is an experienced attorney with a strong background in compliance for healthcare companies. And lastly, I'm also pleased to announce the appointment of Andrew Lynch as our new Chief Strategy Officer. In this role, Andrew will work closely with our executive team and board to oversee the execution of Acadia's growth strategy. Andrew joins Acadia with experience in healthcare, technology and data analytics strategy and innovation. We are delighted to have these three exceptional leaders join our team as we continue to build upon our strong foundation and attract strong talent into the company. I also want to mention we look forward to our first ever Investor Day planned for Wednesday, December 7 in Midtown, Manhattan. Our management team will provide an in-depth look at our diverse service lines and our strategy initiatives to advance our key -- our leadership position in the behavioral healthcare industry. At this time, I will now turn the call over to David Duckworth to discuss our financial results for the quarter.