Dive Brief:
- Connecticut-based Saint Francis Care and Trinity Health announced a merger yesterday that will see the Saint Francis system absorbed into Trinity's network of healthcare providers, according to a news release issued Wednesday.
- Christopher Dadlez, president and CEO of Saint Francis Care, will lead the new regional ministry for the new health system which, he says, "will embody both organizations' shared commitments to Catholic values and high-quality, high-value healthcare."
- Trinity Health is one of the largest multi-institutional Catholic health care delivery systems in the nation. It serves people and communities in 21 states with 86 hospitals, 128 continuing care facilities and home health and hospice programs that provide nearly 2.8 million visits annually. With annual operating revenues of about $13.6 billion and assets of about $19.3 billion, the organization returns more than $89 million to its communities annually in the form of charity care and other community benefit programs.
Dive Insight:
Mergers are always interesting, because combinations that work well on spreadsheets don't always take into account potentially differing healthcare philosophies.
Case in point: Trinity recently adopted a policy of denying healthcare to indigent patients who qualify for ACA subsidies as a way of reducing their charity care bill while encouraging patients to secure insurance. However, Saint Francis has not adopted such a policy, and is quite proud of its $900 million annual commitment to charity care.
Though Trinity's policy isn't unique, it's arguably a tricky one for a non-profit, faith-based organization to justify. (After all, denying healthcare to uninsured poor people doesn't seem like a "Catholic value.") It will be interesting to see if Trinity enforces its existing policy on the Saint Francis system, and if they choose to do so, how Saint Francis' rank and file will respond to the shift in priorities.