Essentia Health
Legal name: Brainerd Medical Center Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 371532148
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2009–2024
- Official website data refreshed
- Sep 2026
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024, Form 990-T 2024
- Location
- Duluth, Minnesota, US
- Phone
- 218-786-8376
- Rating
- 79
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Ambulatory Health Center, Community Clinic
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $37,334,076
- Expenses
- $39,424,770
- Assets
- $13,089,246
- Liabilities
- $62,860,273
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
30 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- KEVIN BOREN (VICE PRESIDENT, FINANCE)
- TODD DEFREECE (SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, OPERATIONS)
Highest reported compensation
- NEIL KROLL MD (PHYSICIAN): $1,436,525 total reported compensation
- ABY PHILIP MD (PHYSICIAN & SECTION CHAIR): $1,281,332 total reported compensation
- JOHNATHAN VALESANO MD (PHYSICIAN): $1,228,565 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
To make a healthy difference in people's lives.
What it reported doing in 2024
Brainerd medical center, inc., dba essentia health brainerd specialty clinic, is created and organized exclusively for charitable, religious, educational, and scientific purposes. More specifically, essentia health brainerd specialty clinic shall own, maintain, operate and conduct health care and related activities and facilities for the promotion of health within its community, including charitable care to persons unable to pay.essentia health brainerd specialty clinic employs 55 full time equivalents including physicians that cover a wide range of medical specialties and subspecialities and support essentia health st. Joseph's medical center, a related organization. Essentia health brainerd specialty clinic offers outpatient services including imaging/radiology, obstetrics and gynecology, sleep medicine, and outpatient wound treatment.essentia health brainerd specialty clinic had nearly 7,000 encounters during the fiscal year ended june 30, 2025.during the fiscal year ended june 30, 2025, essentia health brainerd specialty clinic provided the following community benefits: $100,000 in charity care, $3.1 million costs in excess of medicaid payments, and $77,000 in health profession education.essentia health is the parent organization of an integrated health system that includes this organization and all entities that are owned or controlled, directly or indirectly, by essentia health (collectively, the "system or "essentia health").
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Earned-program. 100% of the money available for current operations came from fees and other program revenue.
- Distribution model
- Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Revenue has declined or grown slowly and expenses are high relative to revenue.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 83
- Transparency & Controls: 83
- Accountability: 90
- Sustainability: 10
- Growth: 40
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 96.3%; rating input score 96
- Program expense ratio: 90.2%; rating input score 90
- Fundraising efficiency: Limited
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 62nd percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 3 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 50
- Compensation committee: Pass
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
- Written employment contract: Missing
- Compensation survey or study: Pass
- Board or committee approval: Pass
- Foreign activity oversight: Limited
- Grant itemization coverage: Limited
- Major donor itemization: Limited
- Related-party transparency: Yes; rating input score 100
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 83.3%; rating input score 83; 17th percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 9 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 100
- Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
- Whistleblower policy: Pass
- Document-retention policy: Pass
- CEO compensation review process: Pass
- Other executive compensation review process: Pass
- Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Pass
- Independent financial-statement audit: Pass
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -5.6%; rating input score 15; 15th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.33; rating input score 9; 9th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 4.8; rating input score 0; 0th percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 21.1%; rating input score 3; 3rd percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 7.1% per year; rating input score 100; 57th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -1.9% per year; rating input score 0; 5th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: -3.6% per year; rating input score 0; 4th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- What they do: 5 programs and campaigns described on the official site · 3 operating locations identified
- Where the money goes: 96.3% of revenue deployed · 90.2% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 10 of 12 board members independent · 9 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 2 filed program accomplishments · $35.6M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $1.4M · 30 people listed · 3 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Consistency: 29 of 29 current checks pass
- Schedules: 5 filed schedules · includes executive pay and related organizations
- Filing history: 16 filing years from 2009 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 9 filed money-flow records
- Related organizations: 27 filed related-organization links
- Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
- People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
Key Signals
Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 15/100.
- High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 9/100.
- High — Growth: Asset growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 3/100.