Nuffield Health sees strong growth with complete health strategy

The annual report shows how Nuffield Health continues to deliver its complete health strategy, the not-for-profit has reported a robust financial performance for the year, which saw a revenue increase of 9% to £711 million and EBITDA from continuing activities reach £81million, a 13% rise from 2013.

During the year, £74million was invested to extend the scale and scope of its operation.  And in August, the acquisition of 10 new gyms expanded the organisation’s nationwide footprint, adding 26,000 members and  providing a more complete health and wellbeing proposition in an additional six locations, where hospitals and gyms are now co-located.

An incredibly strong year for Nuffield Health’s Hospitals Division saw exceptional year on year growth.  Revenues for continuing activities increased by 9% and EBITDA grew 21% on 2013, driven primarily by self-pay treatments and NHS activity.  The hospital portfolio saw significant investment of £42million to extend its reach in areas including Manchester, as well as improve and expand facilities, and develop services. 
 This included:

• Rebuild of the Cambridge Hospital
• Improved diagnostic facilities at Bournemouth, Chester, Leicester and Oxford 
• Opening of a Centre of Excellence for Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine at Wessex 
• Initial stages of Manchester Hospital project to improve health and wellbeing in the North West of England.

Delivering further on its complete health and wellbeing strategy, 2014 saw the launch of Recovery Plus, a recovery pathway which combines expertise from both hospitals and gyms. Taking place at a Fitness & Wellbeing Gym, the free post-operative 12-week rehabilitation programme is for individuals who have undergone surgery and have finished their formal treatment.  The programme aims to improve recovery and help patients get into even better shape than they were in before they went into hospital. The programme is available for patients who have elective surgery for 27 procedures and by the end of 2014 Recovery Plus was offered in 29 hospitals and 47 associated Fitness & Wellbeing Gyms.

In a challenging market, Nuffield Health’s Wellbeing division delivered an impressive performance with turnover rising, resulting in a £19 million (10%) increase on 2013. Focusing on providing a more complete offering to its members, clinical services such as health assessments were introduced into more Fitness and Wellbeing Gyms.  Physiotherapy was a considerable growth area for the business, with 617,000 sessions delivered and by the end of the year, 74 out of 77 consumer gyms offered physiotherapy services on site.

Close to £15million was invested in maintaining and developing gyms including over £1million improving Nuffield Health’s flagship City gym, upgrading technology, equipment and expertise.  In June 2015 two London sites were acquired in Shoreditch and Moorgate, whilst Shoreditch is rapidly becoming one of the most vibrant entrepreneurial locations in the UK, Moorgate presents an opportunity to expand employee wellbeing services to existing corporate customers and engage with new ones.

With a bespoke approach to employee wellbeing, with services including health assessments, onsite clinics, in-house GPs, nutritionists as well as workplace gyms, Nuffield Health extended their operations to 208 employee facilities and increased revenue by 15% to £87million.  The organisation works with over 60% of the FTSE100, helping to maintain a healthy workforce and was awarded the Best Provider of Workplace Wellbeing Services 2014, for the third year running.  

David Mobbs, Group Chief Executive, Nuffield Health said:   
“Although the markets have been challenging, the business has performed strongly with significant growth over the past twelve months.  Our finances remain solid and we have been able to sustain a substantial level of investment that has allowed us to improve and modernise our existing services, enter into new markets and develop digital and technology platforms. We will continue to deliver our strategy to offer complete health and wellbeing services to more communities in order to prevent long term poor health.”

In October, in an innovative move, Nuffield Health secured £330million from a combination of banks and institutional lenders, extending the maturity of its financing to support its long term strategy.  The agreement demonstrated strong support for the business and its strategic development plans for an integrated approach to prevention, treatment and cure.

Russell Hardy, Chairman, Nuffield Health added:
“We have made sound progress in implementing our strategy and shown a strong financial performance. The investment in our infrastructure and overcoming the challenges faced in all our markets was essential. Despite the changing economic backdrop, positive results have been achieved across the organisation.”

• Download the 2014 annual report
• Read some of our members and patients life stories
• Download our annual quality report

Last updated Tuesday 22 March 2016

First published on Thursday 25 June 2015