Illinois hospital board holds hearing on Ascension Saint Joseph-Joliet sale

Joliet — The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board held a hearing Friday to discuss the planned acquisition of Ascension Saint Joseph-Joliet hospital by Prime HealthCare.

The board, which oversees hospitals and must approve the change in ownership for it to proceed, conducted the hearing in the theater at Billie Limacher Bicentennial Park in Joliet and offered the public an opportunity to present comments on the issue.

California-based Prime HealthCare announced plans in July to purchase Saint Joseph-Joliet as well as eight additional Ascension medical facilities in Illinois, including their satellite offices, as well as four senior living facilities, among them Villa Franciscan Place in Joliet, for a total of $375 million. Ascension will retain an additional five hospitals in the state.

Prime Healthcare is a for-profit medical system that operates 44 hospitals and more than 300 outpatient locations in 14 states.

About a dozen people attended the Friday hearing, which included brief comments from Ascension Illinois CEO Polly Davenport, Prime HealthCare’s Director of Government Relations Fred Ortega, and Ascension Saint Joseph-Joliet CEO Barbara Martin.

Davenport said Ascension believes Prime HealthCare will be “the best stewards of these hospitals for the future and ensure sustainable, quality healthcare options for generations to come” in the impacted communities.

“We consider it an honor and tremendous responsibility to have been selected by Ascension Health as the stewards of its Illinois facilities,” Ortega said.

Ortega said Prime HealthCare was founded with “the mission of saving, improving and investing in community hospitals” and that the organization plans to invest $250 million in capital improvements for the Ascension facilities and retain the existing staff at the acquired hospitals. He also said Prime would “respect” the Catholic tradition of the Joliet hospital and continue all current services provided by the hospital including charity care.

Only one resident, Damon Zdunich, spoke at the hearing and expressed concerns about Prime as a for-profit healthcare company, and the size of the investment the company was willing to make in Illinois communities.

“I remember the history of St. Joe’s as being a stellar hospital and the investments they made in the community from the early 90s to around 2005, it was $300, $350 million. It was a very substantial investment they made to provide great healthcare for Joliet citizens,” Zdunich said, before noting that after repeated acquisitions, including by Ascension, quality had diminished and “we saw a lot of strife in the community and a lot of management-labor issues.”

The Joliet hospital has undergone several changes in ownership over the past 30 years, before becoming an Ascension hospital and was last year embroiled in a months-long labor dispute with its nurses union over issues of pay and staffing numbers.

Zdunich went on to question Prime HealthCare’s legal record and expressed concerns that “private equity investment may be increasing medical costs.”

“When I look back at what the nuns spent in 25 years on one hospital, it dwarfs that $250 million,” he said.

When asked about these concerns after the hearing, Ortega said “part of the acquisition agreement is maintaining Ascension’s existing level of charity care and community care benefits. The community will not see a difference in costs of services.”

Ortega suggested that continued charity care will cover uninsured patients’ costs as before while insured patients will still be covered. He also said that when employees are retained by Prime from Ascension the existing union contracts will remain the same through the end of their terms.

Davenport declined to comment on the specific reasoning behind the decision to sell facilities to Prime, though Ascension issued a statement after the hearing saying “We are proud of the quality of care our Ascension Illinois hospitals have provided over the years. We thank the Illinois Health Facilities Services and Review Board for hosting these public hearings for the communities we are privileged to serve and look forward to appearing before the Board. We firmly believe this transfer of ownership preserves jobs and ensures needed healthcare access across Chicagoland, as well as investment in Illinois for the future.”

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board is tentatively scheduled to review its acquisition plan for Ascension’s facilities on Oct. 29 at the Bolingbrook Golf Club.

Members of the public who were unable to attend the Friday meeting, or who wish to submit additional comments can send their written thoughts on the acquisition to DPH.HFSRB@Illinois.gov by Oct. 9.