Dive Brief:
- The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center is expanding its global footprint through a new 15-year management agreement with GK Klinika Group in Lithuania. UPMC’s Advisory Services will be designing and managing a new cancer center set to open in 2017 in the nation’s capital city of Vilnius.
- UPMC will be responsible for training cancer center staff and overseeing clinical, technology and administrative aspects of the center. UPMC will also provide telemedicine services for consults and advanced procedures.
- Lithuania’s healthcare system provides public funding for both inexpensive and basic medical care. An insurance fund made up of payroll taxes and federal funds is used for hospitalization and acute treatment. Patients covered by public and private insurance will be accepted at the cancer center, but GK Klinka is funding the project.
Dive Insight:
The agreement in Lithuania is just the newest one for UPMC’s $10 billion global health services. In 1996, the system helped create a transplant center in Palermo, Italy. Its ventures in Ireland, holding part of Beacon Hospital in Dublin, were only mildly successful. This year, it sold its remaining stake of the organization for a $106 million loss, while it kept its stake in another cancer center in the country. UPMC’s Advisory Services has contracts in 10 countries including China, India, Japan, Singapore and Kazakhstan. UPMC provides pathology consultations to KingMed Diagnostics, China’s largest independent medical laboratory. The organization provides advisory services and assistance to Xiangya Hospital of Center South University and Xiangya International Medical Center. UPMC researchers also recently won a $4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for a 25-year study of two populations of cancer patients in Shanghai and Singapore.