Turning Delaware County Memorial Hospital in Drexel Hill into an inpatient mental health facility can help people with addiction and mental health issues, but there are still questions whether that’s best for the community and profitable for Crozer, writes Abraham Gutmana and Harold Brubaker for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Plans from Crozer Health, owner of the hospital, and its for-profit parent company, Prospect Medical Holdings, call for two inpatient psychiatric units, and an adult inpatient acute detox and rehab unit.

Other plans include a new urgent care center, maternal-fetal medical services for high-risk pregnancies, a microbiology lab, a home health, and hospice unit, and an ambulance substation.

Crozer CEO Tony Esposito said the health system is losing $1.5 million for every month that Delaware County Memorial sits empty while its fate is decided.

An inpatient psychiatric and drug treatment facility would be “slightly profitable,” he said.

“It’s not a moneymaker, but we go from losing $18 million a year to making $3 million and providing needed services to the community,” Esposito said.

The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council reports that 23 psychiatric hospitals in Pennsylvania fell just short of breaking even in the years between 2019 to 2021.

Read more about Crozer Health’s mental health facility profit gamble at The Philadelphia Inquirer.