Ministry sells dialysis program to DaVita

Ministry sells dialysis program to DaVita
10:37 PM, Jun. 1, 2011 |

Written by
Molly Newman

Ministry Health Care announced that its dialysis program has been purchased by national dialysis
provider DaVita Inc. effective Wednesday.

DaVita, which is based in Denver and has more than 1,600 dialysis facilities throughout the country, will take ownership of Ministry's nine outpatient dialysis locations and will manage its inpatient dialysis services at four local hospitals, said Ministry Home Care CEO Jerry Cleveland.

All 145 Ministry dialysis employees will become DaVita employees. Ministry Saint Joseph's Hospital in Marshfield, Ministry Saint Michael's Hospital in Stevens Point, Ministry Saint Clare's Hospital in Weston and Howard Young Medical Center in Woodruff still will own their dialysis services departments, but they will be managed and staffed by DaVita. The hospitals will pay on a per-treatment basis for inpatient dialysis services, Cleveland said.

"Because it's an inpatient business, DaVita can't own that without owning the hospitals," he said. "In order for there to be (Medicare) reimbursement, the inpatient program has to be at a hospital."

Cleveland said Ministry made the decision to sell to DaVita because of industry and financial concerns. There's been an industry trend toward selling dialysis services to large companies like DaVita during the past several years to save money.

"Less than 5 percent of hospitals or health care systems nowadays have their own dialysis program," he said. "The broader your base and the larger the number of patients you have, the lower your cost."

Ministry served about 350 patients at its outpatient dialysis facilities. DaVita serves about 128,000 patients nationwide.

There already are about 40 DaVita facilities in Wisconsin, said company spokesman Vince Hancock, who added the company is always looking to acquire new locations.

"DaVita just wanted to expand into central Wisconsin," he said.

There won't be any significant changes in either the patient or the employee experience, Hancock said.

"Patients are going to continue to receive excellent care," he said. "All current dialysis employees will be offered positions with DaVita."

DaVita also plans to hire additional employees during the transition, but the number is unknown at this time.

Both Cleveland and Hancock declined to comment on the cost of the transaction.

http://www.wausaudailyherald.com/article/20110602/CWS03/306020037/Ministry-sells-dialysis-program-DaVita