Hawai'i boasts the fourth-highest cost for private nursing rooms, according to a new study that found the average daily cost is 44 percent higher here than the national average.

The average daily rate in Hawai'i was $306 a day in 2008, a study by the MetLife Mature Market Institute found. That works out to $111,690 a year.

Hawai'i trailed only Alaska, Connecticut and New York in statewide daily rates and was $94 higher than the national average of $212. The costs here are tied in part to the higher cost of doing business in the Islands, which includes higher wages, energy costs, services and materials.

"Everything costs a little more (in Hawai'i)," said Emmet White, CEO of the Arcadia Retirement Residence and related companies. Arcadia provides long-term care and assisted living among its services.

"It's just a fact of doing business here."

For example, Hawai'i's per kilowatt-hour electricity costs are the highest in the nation, average about three times the national average. White said Arcadia's electricity bill was $88,000 last month, or $30,000 above what had been budgeted.

The lowest statewide rate for private nursing-home rooms was in Louisiana, where it cost $132 a day, or less than half of Hawai'i's average rate. In general, costs were lower in the south and higher around major metropolitan areas.

MetLife didn't release state-wide numbers last year, but did include those for Honolulu. From 2007 to 2008, the average cost of a private room in Honolulu rose $6 to $277 a day.

The figures also show that the average monthly rate for assisted living communities declined over the past year. It reported the 2008 cost was $3,566, or about 5 percent less than 2007.

That ranked the state as having the 12th highest monthly assisted-living rate in the nation. Hawai'i was still above the national average of $3,031.

Learn more:

MetLife: www.metlife.com/Applications/Corporate/WPS/CDA/PageGenerator/0,4132,P2801,00.html