Bills for operations are set to rise and overtime will be slashed as the Bermuda Hospital Board deals with a huge financial crisis.

BHB CEO Stephanie Reid said King Edward VII Memorial Hospital was undercharging for operations and was "owed millions" by uninsured people who had not been exempted from paying on poverty grounds.

She said: "We are finding more and more people coming in who don't have insurance, and who have not be declared indigent, who are not able to pay for services. We are owed millions."

She denied rumours that Perry surgical ward would stay closed to save cash and that redundancies were planned.

Perry ward has has been shut since December 16 for $111,000 worth of renovations on plumbing, electrics and air conditioning. It is due to reopen in early February.

She said the hospital had to make itself more cost effective.

"We are not actually charging for our services what we ought to. The costs of providing services far outweigh what we charge our clients."

She said hospital bills would have to increase to make up for the shortfall.

Mrs. Reid denied redundancies were on the cards but said the hospital was looking hard at whether vacancies needed to be filled. Currently 96 percent of its 1,300 jobs were filled but she said the clinical and technical areas would not be neglected.

She denied the overtime bill had risen because of the unfilled vacancies.

She said financial systems had been tightened up - a fact she said had been recognised by auditors.

Managers were being made more accountable over handing out overtime outside the critical care area, said Mrs Reid.

She said patients were staying far too long and taking up beds.

"We have not done very well with in-patients, we have patients for week, months and years."

She said the only place for long-termers was the continuing care unit.

Asked why this hadn't been addressed earlier, Mrs. Reid said there was a problem in finding places to send patients.

"There needs to be a sort of community home that will be able to accept these patients so can be appropriately cared for.

"In addition to that the community have to be very cognisant when their loved ones on the ward they do have a responsibility that when their loved ones are ready to go home they are ready to accept them.

"If we can't get them out early the turnover of beds is non existent."

She said this added to costs because highly skilled staff ended up caring for patients who could easily be treated by less skilled staff.

Canada and America had addressed the problem by expanding out-patient services, said Mrs Reid.

"We need homes in which to place people. Our beds are not freed up on time."

She said patients had to wait in emergency room beds because there was no space on the wards.

Mrs. Reid revealed their was a committee looking at how to deal with rising health costs with members from the Ministry of Health, BHB and the private sector while the hospital had set up its own committee to look at costs of its own service.

"This hospital is very old, we have put a new building on a very old building. It's become a maintenance nightmare.

"We need the financial support for sensible maintenance of our building.

"We are very concerned about the plumbing at KEMH and also St. Brendan's."

Despite the financial crisis Mrs Reid said the BHB would continue to do $1 million of vital plumbing work in the new fiscal year.

She said: "It's very, very urgent. We need to replace the old galvanised steel pipes with modern material."

Costs of medical supplies were also rising so hospital managers were assessing how to get things cheaper.

"We are not in deficit now but if we don't do something now we will be in debt in the very near future."