From what I’ve seen, the most lucrative hospitals are those that you don’t typically consider to be academic powerhouses. On the contrary, many of them appear to provide care that is far from excellent. Based on personal observation and unfounded stereotype, I’ve created an action plot of the ultimate medical provider framework (outside hospital):

Update 5/5/09 18:30: I’ve realized that cardiac cath reimbursements aren’t what they used to be. The big revenue generators these days are the imaging modalities, like MUGA scans, and even ABI’s. Having a nuclear medicine lab would help pull in the big bucks.

medicine humor, medicine