Hospital chain Iasis reported fiscal second-quarter profits of $11.2 million, a 34 percent decrease from last year, as interest costs rose at a double-digit pace.

Executives at Iasis, who are trying to acquire a struggling Arkansas hospital, said their revenues rose 4 percent to $648 million, with their hospitals’ 20 percent acquisition-driven growth offsetting a drop of more than $50 million at their insurance arm, the result of Arizona Medicare and Medicaid cuts.

Hospital revenues for the quarter included a $15.4 million boost from the April settlement of lengthy Medicare rural payment litigation and a $4.3 million revenue hit from recent adjustments to disproportionate share payment rates. Same-facility adjusted admissions rose 2.1 percent while net revenue per adjusted admission climbed 2.7 percent.

Iasis’ adjusted EBITDA margin held steady from a year ago at 12.7 percent, but the big hit to the bottom line came from interest costs, which rose to 5.5 percent of net revenues from 2.6 percent in the second quarter of 2011.

 
Call center manager Sitel Worldwide said its first-quarter adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization fell almost 5 percent from a year ago because of margin compression. Revenues for the first quarter rose 8 percent to $364 million after accounting for currency rates.

Adjusted EBITDA at Sitel, which runs more than 135 call centers in 25 countries, came in at $31.7 million. Gross margins fell 1 percentage point to 34.4 percent from early 2011.

 
National Health Investors said its normalized funds from operations rose 18 percent from a year ago to $21.4 million. Per diluted share, the company’s 77-cent normalized FFO beat analysts’ estimates by four cents.

Revenues at the Murfreesboro-based health care real estate investment trust rose 10 percent to $24.1 million. CEO Justin Hutchens also raised his team’s full-year FFO guidance to a range of $3.05 to $3.13. The previous range had been $3.02 to $3.10.

Shares of NHI (Ticker: NHI) were down about 1 percent to $48.96 in late-morning Friday trading. Year to date , they’re up about 11 percent.