The coronavirus pandemic continued to foster financial uncertainty.
The HUS Council confirmed a EUR 15 million surplus as the financial performance goal for the financial period, instead of the previous break even goal. This was due to the uncertainty fostered by the ongoing pandemic and by the care and service deficit thereby generated. The HUS balance sheet carried a EUR 15 million uncovered deficit from the year 2019, which was thus covered.
Binding net costs came to EUR 127.1 million less than budgeted.
The operating volume of service production was 3.6% under budget but showed an increase of 3.7% on the previous year.
The total number of individual patients treated, including health center patients at joint emergency departments, was 668,939. This represented a decrease of 13,446 patients on the previous year. In specialist medical care, including outsourced services, we cared for 588,067 individual patients, or 3.9% fewer than in the previous year. The decrease was mainly due to the fact that in 2020 the coronavirus drive-in testing visits were recorded as specialist medical care visits.
Our service demand grew after the previous year’s dip but remained lower in 2021 than in 2019. The comparable number of referrals for non-urgent treatment was 334,976, an increase of 6.2% on the previous year.
Per capita costs for specialist medical care in HUS member municipalities were EUR 1,044 on average in 2021, about 3.4% less than in the previous year.
Operating costs
Our operating costs at EUR 2,809.7 million were 1% (EUR 27.5 million) over budget. Compared with 2020, operating costs increased by 8.8% (EUR 227 million).
As in the previous year, the coronavirus pandemic had a substantial impact on the actual operating costs in various categories. Personnel costs, outsourced medical services, hired labor and research and care supplies exceeded the budget by EUR 13.3 million, EUR 33.0 million, EUR 4.6 million and EUR 27.8 million, respectively. By contrast, outsourced research capacity services were EUR 29.4 million under budget, and laboratory supplies were EUR 10.8 million under budget.