Whose Hospitals Are They, Anyway? - Steward to Sell Off, but Continue Operating All Its Hospitals

This looks like the latest trend in thefinancialization of and diffusion of accountability for health care organizations.  The case involves good ol 'Steward Health Care, which was the subject of quite a fewHealth Care Renewal posts back in the day.Background - Caritas Christi Bought by Cerberus Capital Management, Became Steward Health Care[Cerberus, the three headed dog,per William Blake]Steward is what used to beCaritas Christi Health Care System, formerly a Catholic, non-profit health care system in Massachusetts.  In 2010, Caritas Christi was purchased by Cerberus Capital Management, aprivate equity, aka leveraged buyout firm, which was known for its not very successful run managing Chrysler (lookhere) and GMAC (lookhere).  Cerberus also had enlarging holdings in the gun industry, later expanded into the Freedom Group, and in military contracting, specifically including DynCorp which hired armed " security forces " and was involved in multiple scandals in Iraq, all of which might strike some health care professionals as inappropriate (lookhere andhere).Steward Health Care, as run by Cerberus, was one of the earlier leaders in hiringcorporate physicians, whom it pressured to avoid " leakage " of patients to other hospitals and doctors, even if some might question whether the care provided elsewhere might be better for those patients (lookhere).  The multimillion dollar a year CEO of Steward suggested the health care had become a commodity, objectionabl...
Source: Health Care Renewal - Category: Health Management Tags: Cerberus financialization hospital systems private equity Steward Health Care Source Type: blogs