SC panel gives MUSC final approval to buy Columbia, Camden hospitals
The Medical University of South Carolina received final approval Tuesday to buy three hospitals in the Midlands, including two based in Columbia.
The State Fiscal Accountability Authority, a five-member state panel whose membership includes the governor and the Legislature’s budget chairmen, voted 4-1 to green light the sale to the state’s second-largest health care provider.
Without discussion on the sale, the SFAA also voted to approve the Charleston hospital’s request for an up to $80 million short-term loan to help MUSC actually make the buy.
The Medical University — one of the oldest medical schools in the South — will buy Providence Health in Columbia and KershawHealth Medical Center in Camden. The pending sales were announced last week.
The Providence sale includes the hospital’s main campus — known as South Carolina’s “heart hospital” on Forest Drive — plus its 74-bed full-service hospital near Farrow Road and I-77 and its Winnsboro emergency room that opened in 2018. The KershawHealth acquisition includes an acute care hospital in Camden and an urgent and outpatient center in Elgin.
Providence and KershawHealth are both currently owned by Lifepoint Health of Tennessee, and KershawHealth is an affiliate of MUSC Health.
The acquisition by the Medical University will give the hospital giant a larger footprint in the state and in the Midlands region, where it will join Prisma Health and Lexington Medical Center.
Last year, Prisma Health, which owns hospitals in the Columbia area and Upstate, attempted to buy Providence and KershawHealth. But that deal — opposed by some state lawmakers who were concerned about layoffs and patient services — fell through, with Prisma attributing it to “a complex regulatory path, significant delays and challenges with the Federal Trade Commission and state regulatory authorities.”
Allowing the Medical University of South Carolina to buy also gives the Legislature more oversight over the hospital, which is public. The hospital is included in the Legislature’s write-up of the budget every year, and any major construction or other large-scale financial requests will be subject to legislative approval.
MUSC Health includes a teaching hospital and six colleges that employ more than 1,800 faculty who train about 3,000 students and 800 residents a year.
In a statement after a unanimous board-approved vote last week, anMUSC spokeswoman said the hospital plans to keep its current employees who are in good standing at the three respective hospitals and medical practices and facilities. That process will include meetings between MUSC officials and hospital administrators to determine staffing and other needs.
Over the past year and a half, MUSC played a role in the state’s COVID-19 response. Not only did it help to deliver COVID-19 tests across the state — and in the State House — but it received millions of dollars through the state to help boost the vaccine rate.
Reporter Emily Bohatch contributed to this story.
This story was originally published June 29, 2021 at 10:45 AM.
