Scarpino emphasized the climate of constant change in the healthcare industry. Thanks mainly to the longstanding presence of the Institute for Family Health, its network of local primary-care physicians continues to be one of HealthAlliance’s strengths. It is seeking to align and integrate its services with a physician network.
This is the complex context within which HealthAlliance must develop its own strategy, Scarpino said last week. The $6.5 million state grant indicates that it has state support for its approach.
Prospective partners
Back in July, new HealthAlliance board Chairman Kevin Ryan disclosed that “affiliation talks” had been going on for several months with potential partners. According to Scarpino, there have since been meetings with six potential partners: Albany Medical Center and St. Peter’s in Albany, HealthQuest in Poughkeepsie, Westchester Medical Center, Hudson Health Partners (a strategic alliance among St. Francis in Poughkeepsie, St. Luke’s-Cornwall in Newburgh and the three-hospital Bon Secours Charity Hospital System in Port Jervis), and finally Montefiore Medical Center. A meeting is scheduled with at least one additional prospective partner.
Though Scarpino emphasized that HealthAlliance “needed to work with a larger system,” partnerships and alliances don’t necessarily mean mergers. In the emerging world of healthcare, the players often come together in new combinations and dissolve old relationships.
With the entire industry committed to medical information systems and HealthAlliance depending on that technology for clinical integration, data handling has become one of the playing fields of the new local healthcare universe. And that requires an experienced information-handling partner.
“We possess the industry expertise, IT methodologies, proven track record and resources to guide your organization through your most sophisticated clinical and financial transformation efforts,” boasts the website of Emerging Health, the Yonkers-based 400-person Montefiore subsidiary that HealthAlliance is getting state money with which to collaborate. Emerging Health promises to come up with solutions to provide hospital management “with increased visibility across your entire healthcare delivery network.”
Thanks for your work on this…I only know that much of the consolidation that has happened under the Healt Alliance brand has to do with the way money flows into the economy from sources that, in turn, want to see a higher rate of return.