Get Your Share of the $9 Billion Pie

Yep, you read that correctly. Nine billion dollars.

That’s how much U.S. healthcare institutions raised in FY 2012—and you, too, can get a big piece of that scrumptious, mouth-watering, research-supporting, clinic-funding, life-saving pie.

And the best news? Giving has been on the rise for a full decade, even recovering from a recession-induced dip.

But what does that mean for your hospital? How much of that $9 billion pie should be on your plate? To get an idea, you need to compare your gifts to those of similar institutions.

On average, here’s what different types of institutions are bringing in, as measured by:

• Cash—gifts and payments made this year, no matter when they were pledged
• Production—outright cash (pledged and paid in the current year) plus promised gifts (pledges and letters of intent made in the current year).

For an average healthcare institution, the median production is about $3.2 million with cash around $2.9 million. In general, the sum of cash is about two-thirds of the total production revenue. But those numbers vary widely depending on institution type. For example:

• Children’s hospitals are the biggest gift recipients, bringing in an average $23.5 million in cash and $21.3 million in production.
• Teaching/academic hospitals come in second at $13.3 million in cash and $15.5 million in production.
• Community hospitals rank at the bottom, with $1.6 million in cash and $1.7 million in production.

So how do you measure up?

Remember, giving is on the rise, but whether giving to your hospital is above the median (congrats!) or below (ouch, sorry!), the only way to go from here is up.