TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — Locals on this metropolis of 58,000 are used to having to attend at railroad crossings for one of many dozens of day by day cargo trains to move by.
However a proposed merger between the 2 hospitals on both facet of the town may exacerbate the issue in emergencies if the hospitals shut down some providers, akin to trauma care, at one website, which the proposal cites as a risk. Tom Excessive, hearth chief of a close-by township, mentioned some first responders could be pressured to move important sufferers farther, risking longer delays, in the event that they turn into what locals name “railroaded” by a passing practice.
That’s simply one of many fears on this neighborhood as Indiana officers evaluation whether or not to permit Union Hospital, licensed as a 341-bed facility, to buy the county’s solely different acute care hospital, the 278-bed Terre Haute Regional Hospital. The proposed deal additionally raises issues about diminished tax income, worsening care, and better costs.
Inside the subsequent few months, the Indiana Division of Well being should discover “clear evidence” that the proposed merger would enhance well being outcomes, entry, and the standard of care. These advantages should “outweigh any potential disadvantages.”
Because the nation’s well being care business has turn into extra concentrated amid a gradual clip of mergers in latest many years, it’s frequent for one giant system to dominate a market. On this case, the deal could be Indiana’s first merger beneath the COPA legislation, quick for Certificates of Public Benefit, that the state enacted in 2021. Such legal guidelines permit offers that the Federal Commerce Fee in any other case considers unlawful as a result of they scale back competitors and sometimes create monopolies. To mitigate the damaging results of a monopoly, the merged hospitals sometimes conform to circumstances imposed by state regulators.
Union Hospital leaders mentioned it’s time to maneuver “beyond competition” for the sake of the area, which has struggled to maintain jobs and lift life expectancy charges. Hospital spokesperson Neil Garrison mentioned the merger would in the end enhance care, improve entry, and lower prices. Leaders of Regional Hospital, which is owned by for-profit chain HCA Healthcare, didn’t reply to questions concerning the proposal.
One uncommon implication arises, although: If the merger is permitted, the encompassing county would lose tax income from certainly one of its bigger companies. Union Hospital, which as a nonprofit is exempt from paying taxes, could be buying tax-paying Terre Haute Regional, which paid roughly $508,000 in county taxes for 2023, mentioned Vigo County Auditor Jim Bramble. That’s the equal of the beginning salaries of about 9 sheriff’s deputies, per the county’s $83 million 2024 funds.
Garrison mentioned the hospital system is conscious of the tax implications for the county and is “exploring opportunities” to deal with it.
In the meantime, Roland Kohr, previously a pathologist at Regional and a county coroner, frets about erasing competitors that pressured the hospitals so as to add providers or match the opposite. “The push to introduce new technologies, to recruit more physicians, that may not happen,” he mentioned.
The FTC has urged states to keep away from COPAs, pointing to analysis that discovered they “have resulted in significant price increases and contributed to declines in quality of care.” The fallout of comparable mergers has triggered federal sanctions in North Carolina and pushback from locals and legislators in Tennessee.
“A merged hospital system that faces little remaining competition after the merger usually has little incentive to follow through with its promises because patients have no other choice,” wrote Chris Garmon, a College of Missouri-Kansas Metropolis economist who has studied COPA mergers, in a warning to Indiana well being officers concerning the proposed merger.
Indiana already has among the many highest hospital costs within the nation, in keeping with a research by the Rand Corp. analysis group. The Indiana Legislature spent the previous 12 months making an attempt to rein in costs. Gloria Sachdev, CEO of Indianapolis-based Employers’ Discussion board of Indiana, which pushed for these pricing limits on behalf of annoyed enterprise leaders, is frightened a Union-Regional merger would undo these positive aspects and lift costs additional.
Indiana’s COPA restricts how a lot the hospital may improve fees, Garrison mentioned.
Elsewhere, the biggest COPA-created hospital system within the nation, Ballad Well being, has reported that the time sufferers spend in its ERs in Virginia and Tennessee earlier than being hospitalized has greater than tripled, reaching practically 11 hours, within the six years since that monopoly of 20 hospitals shaped. Nonetheless, Tennessee has awarded Ballad prime marks even when sure high quality metrics, together with its ER pace, fall under established benchmarks.
Ballad Well being spokesperson Molly Luton mentioned the system’s efficiency has improved since these statistics had been gathered.
Final fall, some Tennesseans unsuccessfully urged a county board to name on the state to higher regulate the hospital system. This spring, state lawmakers refused to listen to testimony from residents who drove 5 hours to Nashville to testify for a invoice that sought to restrict future COPA mergers within the state — which in the end didn’t make it to a full vote.
Issues have additionally occurred when a COPA — and its oversight — are eliminated, leaving the merged hospital system as an “unregulated monopoly.” After North Carolina repealed its COPA in 2015, a subsidiary of HCA Healthcare purchased Mission Well being, a COPA-created monopoly in Asheville, for $1.5 billion in 2019. The monopoly in Asheville remained however not one of the COPA’s circumstances utilized to the brand new proprietor.
Final 12 months, authorities inspectors discovered “deficiencies” at Mission Well being that contributed to 4 affected person deaths and posed an “immediate jeopardy” to sufferers’ well being and security, in keeping with the 384-page federal inspection report. North Carolina Legal professional Common Joshua Stein sued HCA’s subsidiary final 12 months, alleging the ER was “significantly degraded,” and that the corporate failed to keep up sure important providers, together with oncology care, a violation of a purchase order settlement Stein’s workplace negotiated with it as a result of the corporate acquired a nonprofit.
HCA mentioned it promptly addressed the problems and denied Stein’s allegations in its authorized response to the continued lawsuit, arguing it has expanded providers since its buy. HCA additionally argued that the settlement is silent about sustaining the standard of care.
Again in Indiana, Union Hospital laid the groundwork for its merger greater than three years in the past when its leaders offered the language for COPA laws to then-state Sen. Jon Ford, a Republican in Terre Haute, believing he could be “the best champion for this proposal,” in keeping with legislative testimony from Taylor Hollenbeck, an RJL Options marketing consultant on the merger. Ford, listed on the legislature’s website because the invoice’s co-author, didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Union CEO Steve Holman testified within the invoice’s hearings that the county’s public well being rankings — with a mean life expectancy rating 68th out of 92 counties within the state — ought to be a “call to action” to do one thing “big and bold.”
Terre Haute Mayor Brandon Sakbun agrees the merger may assist what he referred to as the county’s “abysmal” public well being statistics. Final 12 months, he was elected the town’s youngest mayor at age 27 on a promise to “turn Terre Haute around.” The area’s workforce has steadily declined and native leaders have pinned their hopes on a brand new on line casino and a producer of battery components for electrical autos to reverse this pattern.
Sakbun’s father is an OB-GYN at Union, however the mayor mentioned that doesn’t coloration his opinion and that he helps the hospital merger regardless of the lack of the tax base. He believes it should assist recruit medical and different professionals to an space that has struggled to draw prime expertise.
“Do I believe that this is the one that bucks the research?” Sakbun mentioned. “I truthfully do.”
KFF Well being Information correspondent Brett Kelman contributed to this text.
