Almost Family, Inc. (Nasdaq: AFAM) continues to reap the benefits of a joint venture acquisition first announced over a year ago as it prepares to merge with home health heavyweight LHC Group (Nasdaq: LHCG).
Specifically, the Louisville, Kentucky-based company’s fourth-quarter 2017 home health segment net revenue increased 35.5% from the fourth quarter of 2016, to $145.1 million. Episodic admissions, meanwhile, rose 39% to 29,336 in the fourth quarter, the company announced in ts end-of-year earnings Tuesday.
Additionally, AFAM’s full-year 2017 home health segment net revenues rose 34.7% from the prior year to $586 million, and episodic admissions increased 40.4% from 84,401 to 118,535.
The rise in admissions is mainly attributable to AFAM’s joint venture acquisition of Community Health Systems’s (NYSE: CYH) home health operations. The deal, which was announced in late 2016, resulted in the largest public hospital-home health joint venture in the country.
“Successfully integrating our CHS-JV acquisition and completing the transition of the balance of our home health operations, so that we’re now fully on the Homecare Homebase software platform, bode very well for our future,” AFAM Chairman and CEO William Yarmuth said in a Feb. 26 press release announcing the company’s latest earnings.
All the while, AFAM’s planned merger with Lafayette, Louisiana-based LHC Group is anticipated to close near the end of the first quarter of 2018, according to AFAM. The combined company is anticipated to have 781 locations across 36 states.
AFAM’s fourth-quarter 2017 revenue of $200.6 million missed analysts’ expectations by approximately $2.9 million; its fourth-quarter 2017 earnings per share of 58 cents, meanwhile, was in-line with analysts’ expectations.
By end-of-day trading, Almost Family’s stock was up more than 2%, above $60 per share.
Written by Mary Kate Nelson
Companies featured in this article:
Almost Family, Community Health Systems, Homecare Homebase, LHC Group
