Grand Blanc’s McLaren Health Care and Ohio’s St. Luke’s Hospital have signed a letter of intent to work together. As part of the potential integration, McLaren plans to invest in St. Luke’s Hospital to enhance services and grow the hospital’s presence in the community.
Plans include building a cancer center affiliated with the National Cancer Institute-designated Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute; building an orthopedic, neuro, and spine center; upgrading hospital infrastructure and spaces; and more.
“Critical to our decision was the framing opportunities that position St. Luke’s to continue to play an important role in delivering essential and expected health services to the community while providing an attractive environment for our physicians to practice and being an employer of choice,” says Dan Wakeman, president and CEO of St. Luke’s.
Discussions covered the hospital’s commitment to the community and its mission, enhanced operations, development of specialty programs, expanded collaboration efforts to increase relevance as a value leader, access to capital to enable strategic investments, and the ability to attract and retain talent.
“We expect the in-depth analysis that we will be undertaking will confirm that together we will best serve the residents of Maumee, Perrysburg, and the surrounding communities,” says Philip Incarnati, president and CEO of McLaren. “St. Luke’s Hospital is a valuable health care provider in this region. We look forward to growing and enhancing the hospital’s services and programs to continue their long-standing tradition of providing superior-quality health care close to home.”
The evaluation for the integration is expected to last several months and be completed by mid-year after final board and regulatory approvals.
McLaren is a fully integrated health network with 14 hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, imaging centers, 490 employed primary and specialty care physicians, commercial and Medicaid HMOs, and home health and hospice providers serving Michigan and Indiana.
It operates Michigan’s largest network of cancer centers and providers, anchored by the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, one of 51 National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the U.S. McLaren has 26,000 employees and more than 85,500 network providers. Its operations are housed in more than 350 inpatient and ambulatory facilities.
St. Luke’s is a Toledo-area institution located in Maumee, Ohio. It was established in 1906.
