For Sale By Tenet

U.S.A. California

Published

Tenet strikes again:

For sale

Among the hospitals Tenet Healthcare plans to sell are these facilities in California:

* Brotman Medical Center, Culver City, 420 beds

* Centinela Hospital Medical Center, Inglewood, 370

* Chapman Medical Center, Orange, 114

* Coastal Communities Hospital, Santa Ana, 178

* Community Hospital of Huntington Park, Huntington Park, 81

* Daniel Freeman Marina Hospital, Marina del Rey, 166

* Daniel Freeman Memorial Hospital, Inglewood, 358

* Doctors Medical Center, San Pablo, 232

* Encino-Tarzana Regional Medical Center, Encino campus, 151

* Encino-Tarzana Regional Medical Center, Tarzana campus, 236

* Garfield Medical Center, Monterey Park, 210

* Greater El Monte Community Hospital, South El Monte, 117

* Midway Hospital Medical Center, Los Angeles, 225

* Mission Hospital of Huntington Park, Huntington Park, 109

* Monterey Park Hospital, Monterey Park, 101

* Queen of Angels/Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, Hollywood, 434

* Western Medical Center, Anaheim, 188

* Western Medical Center, Santa Ana, 280

* Whittier Medical Center, Whittier, 181

pickledpepperRN

4,491 Posts

Hope it's OK to combine these.

https://allnurses.com/t55745.html

lizz

Senior Member

Registered: Nov 2003

Location: southern california

Posts: 359

Tenent Selling California Hospitals

Sorry that I couldn't find a link, but the LA Times just had a story that Tenent is selling all of their California hospitals, mostly in the LA and OC areas.

Apparently they don't want to pay for earthquake construction upgrades. Does anybody know anything more about this? Are you potentially affected?

__________________

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." --Albert Einstein

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pickledpepperRN

4,491 Posts

Sorry lizz:

Your band didn't work. I like it!

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tenet28jan28,1,5444018.story?coll=la-home-headlines

Tenet to Sell 19 Hospitals in State

By Lisa Girion and Don Lee, Times Staff Writers

Tenet Healthcare Corp. plans to put up for sale nearly a third of its medical facilities, including 19 in California, a move that is expected to vastly alter the health-care landscape in the Los Angeles region.

The Santa Barbara-based company, which has been battered by scandal and steep financial losses, said a major reason for the sale was a state mandate to retrofit its buildings to meet earthquake safety standards. Tenet said it faced $1.6 billion in costs for seismic upgrades at the hospitals earmarked for sale. Many other hospital owners around California also are wrestling with how to pay for such improvements.

Tenet, the largest hospital chain in the state, said it hoped to find buyers for the facilities but couldn't guarantee that they all would remain open. In fact, some analysts and consultants predicted that a number of hospitals could close, further squeezing services in a region struggling to provide adequate emergency care.

Also uncertain is what Tenet's plans will mean for the 15,000 employees who work at the 19 California hospitals being put on the block. All but one of those facilities are in Los Angeles and Orange counties, and they include such major institutions as Queen of Angels/Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, Brotman Medical Center in Culver City and Western Medical Center in Santa Ana.

"This is not good news," said John Edelston, a health-care consultant in Westlake Village and former chairman of the Los Angeles County Emergency Medical Services Commission. "If hospitals close, it will mean less access and longer waits than there already are. And it will create more haves and have-nots" in the medical-care system.

State Sen. Sheila Kuehl (D-Santa Monica), a member of the Senate Health Committee, also expressed alarm.

"I assume that Tenet is selling because it feels it is not making enough money," she said. "If that's the case, then I am worried about who's going to buy and operate the hospitals.... Tenet may have already convinced people that these hospitals are not making money."

Tenet is to detail today its plans to shore up its finances by selling a total of 27 medical facilities nationwide, including eight in Louisiana, Massachusetts, Missouri and Texas. The proposed divestiture is expected to be completed by the end of the year, generating net proceeds of $600 million.

In addition to the previously announced disposition of four other medical centers, the divestiture would whittle Tenet's nationwide chain to 69 facilities from 100. Tenet had 114 hospitals less than two years ago, before it was hit with a series of government investigations into allegedly unnecessary heart procedures, questionable Medicare billing and other issues.

Of the hospitals set to stay in Tenet's portfolio, 17 are in California, which would remain its largest market with $2.5 billion in annual revenue and 17,000 employees.

Tenet's chief executive, Trevor Fetter, said in an interview Tuesday that the sales were aimed at making the company financially stronger and better able to care for patients.

"We're engaged in the turnaround of this company, and in order to do that we've determined to focus on a core group of 69 hospitals," Fetter said.

The hospitals the company plans to keep have "strong positions in their markets," he added. "They are markets that are attractive to us. Some of the markets are very urban markets, so it's not safe to categorize this in any geographic style."

Tenet also noted that the bill for seismic retrofitting at the 17 hospitals it is keeping in California is relatively cheap: $300 million. The costs are far higher at the hospitals it is selling primarily because they are older and larger.

Tenet expects to take a loss on the sale of almost all of the California facilities, home to 4,151 hospital beds.

Fetter said nonprofit organizations and community groups would be included in Tenet's search for buyers.

There is a "vibrant market for people willing to acquire hospitals," he said, and it's rare when buyers can't be found. Last year, the company announced plans to sell 14 hospitals and found buyers for 12. The others were closed.

Some analysts, however, were skeptical that Tenet would do quite so well this time. Given the costs for seismic upgrades and the difficulty of meeting the state's new nurse staffing requirements, experts said, Tenet's California hospitals will be a very tough sell-even at fire-sale prices.

"Why on Earth would anybody want to buy any of them?" said Sheryl Skolnick, managing director at Fulcrum Global Partners, a brokerage in New York. "They've got some pretty crummy assets in terms of their ability to generate a reasonable economic return over a reasonable period of time."

Even if Tenet does find buyers for all or most of the hospitals, there's still likely to be disruption of the delivery of medical care in some communities. There's no guarantee that a buyer will continue to invest in the facility and provide the same level of services or types of treatment as Tenet.

Some of the hospitals up for sale are key links in the region's medical system. Western Medical, for example, is one of only three major trauma centers in Orange County. If it ceases to provide trauma services, "it's going to add more pressure on existing resources," said consultant Craig Myers, a former Orange County hospital executive.

Tenet's finances have deteriorated as its legal woes have mounted. The company lost $523 million in the first nine months of 2003, compared with a profit of $848 million during the first three quarters of 2002.

After peaking at $52.20 in October 2002, Tenet's stock plunged, bottoming at $11.45 in July. Tenet's stock fell 85 cents Tuesday to $16.15 in New York Stock Exchange trading.

sjoe

2,099 Posts

Specializes in Corrections, Psych, Med-Surg.

What Tenet has done has been to move into the LA area (and they have done the same thing elsewhere in the country) over the past several years, buying up many hospitals on the cheap, closing several of them to drive patients to their remaining hospitals (which has also left numerous healthcare workers without jobs, thus keeping down salaries), thereby overloading the remaining physical systems as well as their healthcare workers and reaping the augmented profits (in addition to the extra profits from illegal billing practices, unnecessary surgeries, etc.).

Now that earthquake refitting AND staffing ratios have come into play, Tenet is divesting itself of these now-understaffed and overloaded facilities in the whole of So Cal so it does not have to invest its past excessive profits in infrastructure and increased staffing costs.

The LA area is thus left with:

1) fewer facilities than it had when Tenet moved in,

2) those remaining are understaffed and overloaded in every way,

3) a glut on the market in terms of trying to sell the remaining hospitals, and

4) multitudes of healthcare workers of all kinds without jobs in a healthcare job market soon to be glutted--keeping wages down.

So much for patient care, so much for "we care about our nurses" and (the newest slogan) "Nursing is different here," from the company which recently hired the past editor of Nurseweek, Carol Bradley, as its Chief Nursing Officer--a sellout of obvious PR value. (BTW, thanks Carol, for your strong defense of Tenet in its recent advertisements. Just the kind of information and perspective California nurses needed to become more empowered. You have lost ALL personal and professional credibility in this state. Guess you'll now be moving on. Good riddance.)

Anyone who has followed the Tenet saga over the years is NOT surprised in the least.

Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.

Anyone think that they are doing this to "impress" legislators with loss of PAC money - and to threaten them, regarding mandatory staffing regs?

It seems like very convenient timing.

Sheri257

3,905 Posts

Sorry about posting the other thread. I didn't notice this one until later.

As always, thanks for the link spacenurse.

sjoe

2,099 Posts

Specializes in Corrections, Psych, Med-Surg.
Originally posted by caroladybelle

Anyone think that they are doing this to "impress" legislators with loss of PAC money - and to threaten them, regarding mandatory staffing regs?

It seems like very convenient timing.

And to "get even," since Tenet bitterly fought staffing ratios.

live4today, RN

5,099 Posts

Specializes in Community Health Nurse.

Hmmm...and to think I WAS going to take a travel assignment to a Tenet hospital in CA. Not anymore! :nono:

Sheri257

3,905 Posts

Interesting news from CNA:

They say their nurses will be protected, even if the hospitals are sold:

http://www.calnurse.org/cna/watch/tenet/tenetsec12704.pdf

pickledpepperRN

4,491 Posts

Many Tenet facilities give care that is equal or better than other hospitals. I think it is because the nurses, doctors, and other employees will not allow it.

Accepting work at a Tenet facility still helps the patients.

I will not obligate myself to work at one. I do work registry at some, others put my license at risk.

Other hospitals have unsafe patient care too.

---------------------------

Thanks sjoe! This is less than I meant to say, but incomplete sentences are inexcusable.

That said my excuse is that my DH called me to the TV to hear Hootie & the Blowfish!

sjoe

2,099 Posts

Specializes in Corrections, Psych, Med-Surg.
Originally posted by spacenurse

Many Tenet facilities give care that is equal or better than other hospitals. I think it is because the nurses, doctors, and other employees will not allow it.

Accepting work at a Tenet facility still helps the patients.

It is a personal. I will not obligate myself to work at one. I do work registry at some, others put my license at risk.

This post could use some editing.

pickledpepperRN

4,491 Posts

I meant personal decision.

Thank you, sjoe.

http://www.calnurse.org/cna/press/21904.html

RNs at Tenet's Brotman, Coastal Vote for CNA

Rare RN Union Election in Orange County

Registered Nurses at Tenet Healthcare's Brotman Medical Center in Culver City and Coastal Communities Hospital in Santa Ana voted by wide margins averaging 69% Wednesday night to affiliate with the California Nurses Association the state's largest RN organization.

The Coastal vote marks one of the few Orange County hospitals where the RNs have voted to unionize, a point noted Evelyn Berghell, a Recovery Room RN at Coastal. "Our victory is a great start for Orange County to continue the trend of RNs joining CNA, our professional voice."

About 425 RNs will be represented by CNA at the two Southern California hospitals. In secret ballot elections, the Brotman RNs voted 93 to 37 for CNA, a 72% victory margin. At Coastal, the count was 67 to 35, a 66% margin. About 70% of the RNs eligible to vote cast ballots despite a rare Southern California rainstorm.

"I'm so elated I could shout with joy," said Brotman RN Felicitas Sanchez.

"All our hard work has finally paid off," said Valerie Selden, RN, Telemetry, Brotman. "Let's keep the momentum going."

Brotman, a well known westside Los Angeles hospital, and Coastal become the second and third Tenet hospitals where RNs have voted to join CNA following a December, 2003 agreement which provides for an enhanced voice for RNs in patient care delivery, and fair, expedited union elections.

RNs at Midway Hospital Medical Center in Los Angeles voted for CNA earlier this month, and elections are pending at 18 other Tenet facilities.

"We chose CNA, the largest and strongest professional RN organization in California, to improve the working conditions and wages for RNs - and to have a stronger voice here at Brotman," said Sanchez. "Other Tenet hospitals who have not voted yet should join us from Brotman, Midway and Coastal."

Coastal is the first of five Tenet hospitals in Orange County where RNs will be voting on CNA representation this spring. Elections are pending at Chapman Medical Center, Placentia Linda Hospital, Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, and Western Medical Center-Anaheim. CNA has also been meeting with RNs at other non-Tenet Orange County hospitals as well.

"Coastal Community RNs' decision to join CNA is about nurses working together for the future of our nursing profession and for the quality of patient care," said Tussie Chapanond, RN, a critical care nurse at Coastal.

Brotman and Coastal, like Midway before them, are on the list of hospitals that Tenet announced several weeks ago that it plans to divest. The CNA-Tenet accord establishes broad protections in the event of a hospital sale or transfer of control. The new owner must abide by Tenet's CNA contract where the RNs have voted for CNA, assuring the RNs no loss of pay, benefits, seniority rights or other contract gains.

Many RNs have "been encouraged by the security provisions and the stability offered by the agreement," noted CNA organizing director David Johnson. "The vote brings security and stability and a message of hope to Tenet RNs," said Johnson.

Johnson said CNA representation also enhances the viability of the hospitals that Tenet is selling or transferring, providing potential new owners the assurance of "critical continuity in care with their most experienced, professional RNs, which is also a strong message to those communities about the future of patient care."

CNA now represents some 1,500 RNs at eight Tenet hospitals, and 55,000 RNs overall in 150 California facilities.

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