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Pictured, left to right in September 2022: Dennis P. McKenna, MD, president and CEO of the Albany Med Health System); Jay P. Cahalan, president and CEO of Columbia Memorial Health; Jill Johnson VanKuren, president and CEO of Saratoga Hospital, and Paul Scimeca, president and CEO of Glens Falls Hospital.

ALBANY — The four hospitals, medical college and home care agency under the Albany Medical Center umbrella will share a unified logo to reflect ongoing efforts to streamline services and branding across the system, hospital executives announced Monday at a news conference. 

The Saratoga Springs, Glens Falls and Columbia Memorial hospitals, and Visiting Nurses of Albany, will retain their original names while adopting Albany Med's circular logo, which will be featured in an upcoming advertising campaign.

"Our people are the backbone of our brand," Albany Med Health System President and CEO Dennis P. McKenna said. "We are one team, 16,000 professionals strong, standing ready to care for the three million people of our region."

The announcement comes days after news leaked that Albany Med leadership would cut 37 jobs at its main Albany campus, primarily on the management side, as part of a major financial restructuring. 

Health care organizations, including Albany Med, say they are facing unprecedented financial struggles as federal COVID-19 relief dollars run out. 

Albany Med and other health care providers were forced during the pandemic to rely on private staffing agencies, which drove up nurses' hourly rates by 213 percent, McKenna said.

Officials said they plan to launch an internal staffing agency to encourage nurses who enjoy the flexibility of temporary assignments to stay local and work within the Albany Med system. 

Hospitals in upstate New York operate with slim profit margins and the ongoing COVID-19 health crisis raised the costs of good and services across the board, hospital executives said.  At the same time, reimbursement from insurance providers, including Medicare and Medicaid, stayed flat.

"In a good year for hospitals in upstate New York, it's maybe break-even or a 1 percent margin ... then the pandemic hits and we know that ultimately led to the Great Resignation," which resulted in higher staffing costs but lower revenues as transfers from other hospitals had to be turned away, McKenna said. 

Top hospital executives at Albany Med earned seven-figure salaries and bonuses during the pandemic, financial documents show. The seven highest paid Albany Med officials were collectively paid upwards of $10 million in 2020, according to hospitals' federal filings recently compiled by USA Today.

The highest paid Albany Med executive that year was the hospital's previous president and CEO, James J. Barba, who earned more than $2.3 million. Barba stepped down in March 2020.

McKenna said last week's layoffs were just "one step in many steps" in a financial mitigation plan that ramps up hiring on the clinical side and increases efficiencies across the hospital system. Building up the clinical workforce would expand bed capacity at the four hospitals and enable the facilities to accept more transfers from other hospitals.

In addition to consolidating its brand, the health care system plans to deepen connections between the four hospitals to improve the coordination of specialized services in the region.

"On this campus here, we receive calls - probably 50 to 100 different hospitals - on any given year that want to transfer patients here ... some of those transfers need to be cared for on this campus here. There are services we provide in the region that quite frankly, no one else does," McKenna said. "But there are many other cases (in which) one of our other three hospitals in our system would be absolutely spectacular places to get care."

The hospitals will eventually share a common digital medical records system and one patient portal, features that are expected to go live in 2024.

Rachel Silberstein covers health for the Times Union. Previously she reported on education and state politics. You can reach her at rachel.silberstein@timesunion.com or 518-454-5449.