Ascension to sell 9 Illinois hospitals to for-profit health system

CHICAGO (OSV News) -- The largest Catholic health system in Illinois cleared a significant step in the process of trying to sell more than half of its hospitals in the state to a for-profit health system.

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board on Dec. 17 approved the sale of 11 facilities -- nine hospitals and two outpatient surgical centers -- of St. Louis-based Ascension's Illinois hospitals to Ontario, California-based Prime Healthcare. Only two of the hospitals mentioned in the sale will continue to operate as not-for-profit.

The Illinois board lists the purchase price at $375 million and expects the sale to be completed by Dec. 31.

The sale would mark Prime Healthcare's entry into Illinois.

According to a July news release that first announced the proposed sale, four other Ascension locations in Illinois, including senior living facilities and post-acute care facilities, will be sold as well. Ascension said Prime Healthcare would invest $250 million in facility and system upgrades, capital improvements as well as "substantial technology improvements."

Ascension's media relations department sent OSV News a statement saying the Catholic health system's Illinois group expressed gratitude for the review board's approval of the sale.

"Ascension Illinois leaders are grateful for the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board's unanimous decision to approve the transfer of ownership of nine acute care hospitals and two ambulatory surgery centers from Ascension Illinois to Prime Healthcare," said the statement. "We firmly believe the Board's approval of this project will preserve jobs and ensure needed healthcare access across Chicagoland, as well as investment in Illinois for the future."

However, the sale was opposed by the National Nurses United union. The union, which has tussled with Ascension before, had urged the Illinois state board in an Oct. 18 letter to reject the sale over what it described as "Prime Healthcare's history of putting profits over patients, leading to illegal and unethical practices that risk people’s health, in addition to the elimination of crucial health services in the community."

According to a September release on its financials, Ascension reported a net $1.1 billion loss for fiscal year 2024. It reported a balance sheet of nearly $41 billion of assets and over $15 billion in liquidity.

According to a 2021 analysis published in the Journal of Healthcare Management and titled "The Changing Landscape of Catholic Hospitals and Health Systems, 2008-2017" a Catholic hospital today "is more likely to be partnered with a non-Catholic hospital or to be owned by a for-profit system than to be solely partnered with or operated by another Catholic system."

The analysis found of the more than 4,200 hospitals it studied over nearly a decade, about 530 changed ownership or management. Its abstract said there was greater decentralization at the Catholic hospitals taking place over this time frame, and that Catholic hospitals today "appear to be more similar to their non-Catholic counterparts."

According to Ascension, the sale is subject to canonical approval. A spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Chicago told OSV News Dec. 27 that it had no comment on the pending sale.