Sale of two California hospitals is finalized

Adventist Health has finalized the purchase of two California hospitals from Tenet Healthcare Corp.

The completion of the deal comes just about a month after Adventist and Tenet announced an agreement on a $550 million deal. With the move, Tenet has finalized the sale of six California hospitals in recent days.

In the latest transaction, Adventist Health has acquired two hospitals on California’s central coast: Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center and Twin Cities Community Hospital. The hospitals are based in San Luis Obispo County.

Early in the morning of March 29, Kerry L. Heinrich, president and CEO of Adventist Health, visited physicians and other staff at Sierra Vista. He called it “an invigorating experience with an incredible team of clinicians.”

“I am grateful for the opportunity to expand our mission to the Central California Coast," Heinrich said in a statement. "We are committed to providing access to the full continuum of care that our patients deserve and is absolutely essential to the community.”

Sierra Vista Regional is now known as Adventist Health Sierra Vista. The 162-bed hospital first opened in 1959. Twin Cities Community Hospital is now called Adventist Health Twin Cities. The hospital, which has 122 beds, first opened in 1977.

With the transaction, Adventist Health, a faith-based, nonprofit hospital system now operates 28 acute care hospitals and more than 440 healthcare sites on the West Coast and in Hawaii. The system employs more than 38,000 people.

The deal also includes a network of 11 primary care and specialty care clinics. The network, formerly known as Tenet Health Central Coast Primary & Specialty Care, is now Adventist Health Medical Group.

Adventist Health also announced that Eleze Armstrong will serve as interim chief executive officer of both hospitals. She had served as CEO of Twin Cities and formerly served as chief operating officer of Sierra Vista.

Adventist said it would accept all insurance plans that the facilities had previously accepted, and patients would continue to see the same providers. The system said it is "committed to maintaining and increasing access to care" for its newest hospitals and clinics.

For Tenet, the for-profit system based in Texas, the deal represents another sale of some of the system’s hospitals.

Last week, Tenet completed the sale of four other California hospitals to UCI Health, the clinical enterprise of the University of California, Irvine.

With that deal, UCI Health acquired Fountain Valley Regional Hospital, Lakewood Regional Medical Center, Los Alamitos Medical, Placentia-Linda Hospital, and a host of associated clinics. Tenet previously said the four hospitals, based in Orange County and Los Angeles County, were sold for $975 million.

Tenet also recently completed a separate $2.4 billion deal to sell three South Carolina hospitals to Novant Health.

Last year, John Muir Health had planned to purchase San Ramon Regional Medical Center from Tenet, the majority owner of the facility. The Federal Trade Commission opposed that deal, citing concerns about reduced competition and higher prices, and the planned sale was abandoned.

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