Health Care & Insurance  October 29, 2014

UCHealth enters deal to buy Longmont Clinic

LONGMONT – Aurora-based University of Colorado Health has signed a letter of intent to purchase Longmont Clinic, the two announced Wednesday.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed. But UCHealth spokesman Dan Weaver said it’s anticipated that the deal would be finalized by the end of the year. Longmont Clinic physicians, at their board meeting on Monday, voted overwhelmingly to join UCHealth and sign the letter of intent, the official announcement said.

Longmont Clinic administrator Jack Campbell said both Longmont Clinic and its satellite office, Carbon Valley Medical Center, would likely keep their names, with UCHealth worked into the names or logos somehow. He said the move to join a larger system was driven by the trend in health care toward coordination of care across multiple organizations and providers.

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If the deal is finalized, Longmont Clinic’s 280 providers and staff would join the UCHealth system, which includes University of Colorado Hospital in Aurora, Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins and Medical Center of the Rockies in Loveland plus a pair of hospitals in Colorado Springs and clinics in Colorado, southern Wyoming and western Nebraska.

“We decided we would be better off and stronger in the long run by affiliating,” Campbell said, noting however that the intent is to “keep business as usual” and provide the same services as it does now.

The deal came as a surprise to Longmont United Hospital officials, who had been in discussions to purchase Longmont Clinic for the past two or three years. LUH last year had signed a letter of intent to purchase Longmont Clinic, which is across the street. But that deal dragged out and stalled.

Campbell said talks with LUH were halted about a month or so ago partly because of uncertainty around which direction the hospital was heading in relation to its own prospects for joining a larger health-care organization. He said Longmont Clinic continued to talk with other systems and decided UCHealth was a good fit.

But LUH spokesman Peter Powers said an offer was still on the table on Monday when hospital officials learned of the pending deal with UCHealth. He said LUH officials knew that Longmont Clinic leaders had talked to other potential buyers but “never believed those to be serious discussions.”

Powers said LUH officials were disappointed.

“We would love to resume discussions with them,” Powers said.

As part of the UCHealth deal, Longmont Clinic physicians and advanced care nurses would become employees of Colorado Health Medical Group, the physician arm of UCHealth. Other staff members would be employed by UCHealth. Campbell said the plan is for the deal to include Longmont Clinic’s buildings and land. The clinic owns its facility in Longmont, but Longmont United Hospital has a stake in the building and land at Carbon Valley Medical Center.

Several Longmont Clinic doctors have had relationships with Medical Center of the Rockies, as well as other hospitals along the Front Range like Children’s Hospital. Campbell said he doesn’t expect the deal with UCHealth to affect any of that, including with LUH, where Longmont Clinic doctors send many of their patients for various services.

“We have no reason not to maintain a positive relationship as much as possible with the hospital,” Campbell said. “That is a major institution in town, and it’s one place where virtually all our doctors send their patients. Our plan is to try to maintain those relationships for the foreseeable future and not disrupt things for our patients.”

Powers said LUH’s hope is that Longmont Clinic patients continue to receive care at the hospital, but was unsure of what UCHealth’s expectations would be as an organization.

“We firmly believe that care should be delivered locally,” Powers said.

As for LUH joining a larger system, Powers said it’s something the hospital has to consider in light of health care trends. But he said the hospital is not in any such discussions with specific systems at this time.

As a nonprofit organization, Powers said LUH is tightly regulated over purchases like the one it tried to make of Longmont Clinic, and any offer has to be approved by third-party consultants.

“We feel very firmly that we gave the best offer we legally could,” Powers said.

LONGMONT – Aurora-based University of Colorado Health has signed a letter of intent to purchase Longmont Clinic, the two announced Wednesday.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed. But UCHealth spokesman Dan Weaver said it’s anticipated that the deal would be finalized by the end of the year. Longmont Clinic physicians, at their board meeting on Monday, voted overwhelmingly to join UCHealth and sign the letter of intent, the official announcement said.

Longmont Clinic administrator Jack Campbell said both Longmont Clinic and its satellite office, Carbon Valley Medical Center, would likely keep their names, with UCHealth worked into the names or logos somehow. He…

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