De novos and other investments have driven Enhabit Inc. (NYSE: EHAB) to 14 months of steady sequential growth.

Enhabit opened five new hospice operations during 2024, building on seven that were established during 2022 and 2023. More de novos are likely on the way, a mix of home health and hospice, according to CEO Barbara Jacobsmeyer.

“We have 14 de novo projects in process, including the four continuing projects from 2024,” Jacobsmeyer said during an earnings call. “Our concentration continues to be weighted towards adding hospice locations adjacent to home health operations, because we benefit from talent recruiting and market brand recognition, as well as referral source awareness.”

Enhabit used income from the prior years’ de novos to finance the new locations launched in 2024. The seven hospice locations launched in 2022 and 2023 generated $6.2 million of revenues and $1.2 million of adjusted EBITDA in full year 2024, CFO Ryan Solomon said during the earnings presentation.

Enhabit operates more than 225 home health locations and 110 hospice locations across 34 states.

The company earned $258.2 million in net service revenue during the fourth quarter of 2024. Its hospice segment brought in $57.8 million, up from $51.1 million year over year.

Hospice average daily census rose 8.6% in Q4 compared to the same period in 2023, representing 12 months of sequential growth. This growth has continued through January and February of 2025, Jacobsmeyer said. Enhabit anticipates hospice average daily census (ADC) growth between 7% to 8.5% during 2025.

Other investments by Enhabit helped fuel these results. One key initiative was the case management model introduced in 2022.

Employing an updated case management model has helped Enhabit in reinforcing its hospice clinical workforce. The company in 2022 began leveraging the model to reduce turnover, seeing the strategy bearing fruit in stronger retention, clinical capacity and census growth.

The case management model has allowed the company to focus greater attention on growing its business development and admission department teams with a goal of more timely patient access and faster referral responses, according to Jacobsmeyer.

Enhabit has also built out a centralized admissions department as well as its business development teams.

“We do feel confident that, now that we have the case management model fully implemented and no capacity constraints, we’ve really started to build on that business development team,” Jacobsmeyer said. “We do have the admissions department in every region now. … We believe those admission departments have been critical. We saw that sequential growth each month of 2024, and it’s continued now in January and February. So we don’t see any reason why that should not continue.”