DaVita first quarter net income increases to $140.1 million

DaVita Inc. (NYSE: DVA) today announced results for the quarter ended March 31, 2012. Net income attributable to DaVita Inc. for the quarter ended March 31, 2012 was $140.1 million, or $1.46 per share. This compares to net income attributable to DaVita Inc. for the quarter ended March 31, 2011 of $94.5 million, or $0.96 per share.

Financial and operating highlights include:

• Cash Flow: For the rolling twelve months ended March 31, 2012 operating cash flow was $1,182 million and free cash flow was $837 million. For the three months ended March 31, 2012 operating cash flow was $332 million and free cash flow was $250 million.
• Operating Income: Operating income for the quarter ended March 31, 2012 was $321 million as compared to $235 million for the same period of 2011.
• Volume: Total U.S. treatments for the first quarter of 2012 were 5,314,275, or 68,132 treatments per day, representing a per day increase of 14.2% over the first quarter of 2011. Non-acquired treatment growth in the quarter was 5.5% over the prior year's first quarter. Our normalized non-acquired treatment growth in the quarter was 5.3% over the prior year's first quarter.
• Effective Tax Rate: Our effective tax rate was 36.7% for the quarter ended March 31, 2012. This effective tax rate is impacted by the amount of third party owners' income attributable to non-tax paying entities. The effective tax rate attributable to DaVita Inc. was 40.5% for the quarter ended March 31, 2012. We still expect our 2012 effective tax rate attributable to DaVita Inc. to be in the range of 40.0% to 41.0%.
• Center Activity: As of March 31, 2012, we operated or provided administrative services at 1,841 outpatient dialysis centers located in the United States serving approximately 145,000 patients and 15 outpatient dialysis centers that are located in three countries outside of the United States. During the first quarter of 2012, we acquired 28 centers and opened a total of 13 centers located in the United States. We previously provided management and administrative services to nine of the acquired centers. In addition, we also opened a total of four centers outside of the United States.

Outlook

We are raising our operating income guidance for 2012 to now be in the range of $1,230 million to $1,310 million. Our previous operating income guidance for 2012 was in the range of $1,200 million to $1,300 million. We also still expect our operating cash flows for 2012 to be in the range of $950 million to $1,050 million. These projections and the underlying assumptions involve significant risks and uncertainties, including those described below, and actual results may vary significantly from these current projections.