A year or so ago, the patient was struggling, but Colorado Springs voters
literally gave it a new lease on life in August, and it's making a rapid
comeback.
Faced with uncertainty over its ownership and governance, Memorial
Hospital was having trouble retaining and attracting doctors, and its patient
volume dropped. But since Memorial became part of the University of Colorado
Health system under a voter-approved lease agreement that took effect Oct. 1,
the number of local doctors who have joined the system's physicians' network
has grown by 40 percent.
The biggest boost came this week, when Memorial announced that Colorado
Springs' largest cardiology practice, Pikes Peak Cardiology, has been acquired
by the Colorado Health Medical Group, which also employs doctors who practice
at Memorial's sister hospitals in northern Colorado. The acquisition brings 88
Pikes Peak Cardiology employees into the UCHealth system, including 14
doctors.
"A year ago, I think some physicians, because of consternation over all
the issues we were facing, chose to seek an environment that offered a little
more stability," Memorial CEO Mike Scialdone said Tuesday. "Now that those
things have been put to bed, I think we now have a stable platform to talk to
physicians about ways of how best they choose to collaborate with us."
Colorado Health Medical Group also recently acquired the practice of Dr.
Laura Pomerenke, a Colorado Springs breast surgeon, and signed two
neurosurgeons, Dr. John McVicker and Dr. Todd Thompson, to beef up Memorial's
network of physicians. Locally, 56 doctors are in the network.
In an era of high operating costs and uncertainty in health-care
financing, more doctors are giving up private practice to join with hospitals
and other organizations.
A recent story in the New York Times cites one report indicating that
about 39 percent of doctors in the U.S. are independent, compared with 57
percent in 2000. Among cardiologists, about 50 percent are employed by health
care systems, said Dr. David Rosenbaum, who was president of Pikes Peak
Cardiology and is governor-elect of the American College of Cardiology
Colorado Chapter.
"And of the remaining 50 percent, the majority are in negotiations with
health care systems, so what we're seeing locally at Memorial is typical of
what's going on across the country," Rosenbaum said.
The doctors with Pikes Peak Cardiology will benefit from being out of
what Rosenbaum calls the "medical arms race," which forces practices to invest
millions of dollars to purchase state-of-the-art equipment. By being part of a
larger organization, especially one tied to a teaching hospital and medical
school, Memorial will be able to take advantage of economies of scale.
But Pikes Peak Cardiology didn't sell the 21-year-old practice just for
economic reasons, Rosenbaum said.
"I think it's because of the partnership with University of Colorado
Health: the economies of scale it brings, of course, but the potential for
partnering opportunities not only with University (Hospital) in Denver, but
certainly the physicians in Fort Collins at Poudre Valley and the Medical
Center of the Rockies. I think it's a huge opportunity to pool resources,
participate in clinical research and really bring, I think, novel health care
therapies to the Pikes Peak region."
The cardiology practice leases space in Memorial's Boulder Street
hospital and has had a longstanding relationship wih the hospital system.
Memorial started its own physicians network in 2011 to double down on
efforts to create an "integrated medical system," which is heralded as a way
to better coordinate patient care and reduce duplication and costs. With the
long-term lease agreement, Memorial was brought under the UCHealth umbrella,
which also includes Poudre Valley Health System and the University of Colorado
Hospital in Aurora, and its doctors became part the Colorado Health Medical
Group.
Memorial spokesman Brian Newsome said the expansion of doctors in the
UCHealth network isn't the only promising sign for the Colorado Springs
hospital system. Memorial recently received certification as a primary stroke
center, and acquired an O-arm, a precision surgical imaging device.
"If you look at Memorial -- where we were, having trouble moving forward
and really losing ground -- in a couple of short months, we've been able to
turn things around," Newsome said.
Distributed by MCT Information Services
