RIDOH approves ‘with conditions’ application to sell Fatima, Roger Williams Hospitals

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — The Rhode Island Department of Health said that it has “approved with conditions” an application to sell Roger Williams Medical Center and Our Lady of Fatima Hospital.

RIDHO said that the “stringent conditions” aim to stabilize the hospitals’ finances, ensure stable operations, and continue providing for the needs of patients.

Attorney General Peter Neronha added that the investigation into the sale was a “robust review” that followed the state’s Hospital Conversions Act.

“Our team was guided by the baseline principle that Rhode Islanders deserve quality, accessible and affordable health care,” Neronha said. “We also know that the future of these hospitals is critical to the collective landscape of health care in Rhode Island. This decision and the conditions we have placed on the transfer of ownership were only arrived at after careful consideration and strong scrutiny.”

The hospitals are currently owned by Prospect Medical Holdings, who in the past was accused of underfunding the hospitals and were ordered to pay unpaid bills to vendors.

The sale would put the hospitals under the ownership of the Centurion Foundation, a Georgia-based non-profit company.

The conditions of the sale include ordering the foundation to keep the hospitals in good financial standing, that Prospect must settle outstanding balances, and ordering the hospitals to not eliminate care without the approval of RIDOH.

“Rhode Island needs a stable network of hospitals that supports the health and wellness of every community in the state,” Director of Health Jerry Larkin said. “In light of the historical and ongoing financial and operational challenges at the hospitals, RIDOH issued a decision today with conditions carefully developed to restore local control, help stabilize these two facilities, and help ensure that the new operators would be positioned to provide consistent, safe, high-quality care.”

United Nurses and Allied Professionals, the union that represents nurses at the hospitals, released a statement that said the conditions “are not nearly enough” to ensure the “viability” of the facilities:

The conditions set forth in the decision are not nearly enough to ensure the long-term viability of CharterCare’s hospitals and healthcare facilities. Centurion does not have to put up a meaningful amount of their own capital, and the entire transaction relies on saddling these hospitals with more and more debt – to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. When you consider the fact that CharterCare’s hospitals and healthcare facilities are losing tens of millions of dollars in operating costs every year, the decision makes even less sense.

Since Centurion submitted their application, we have loudly and consistently sounded the alarm about their business model. The math simply does not work without them putting a meaningful amount of their own skin in the game. Our union is disappointed in this decision. Coming on the heels of Prospect’s disastrous ownership of these important community hospitals and healthcare facilities, you would think these conditions would have been much, much stronger. Clearly, that is not what has happened – and the long-term success of Our Lady of Fatima Hospital, Roger Williams Medical Center, and Prospect Home Health and Hospice remains at great risk.