Hospital Wars ? NCMC and PVHA Can’t Agree

It seems there's some animosity between the two health systems as they try to protect their turf and prospective revenue from insurance.

The Greeley Trib is reporting on the feud and how the two systems apparently can't agree to get along.

Officials from NCMC Inc. rejected a suggestion from their Fort Collins-based competitor that the two cooperate to build an emergency department in west Greeley, and they blasted Poudre Valley Health System CEO Rulon Stacey for trying to poach patients from west Greeley.

“He’s trying to strip mine as many insurance cards out of the 80634 zip code as he possibly can,” NCMC Inc. board executive officer Ken Schultz said. “Our hospital, as a charity, we rely on those high-end patients that have those insurance cards. If he strip mines this layer out, we are going to be left holding the bag.”

During an hour-and-a-half long interview with The Tribune this week, NCMC Inc. board chairman Al Dominguez, Schultz and NCMC CEO Rick Sutton expressed growing frustration with Fort Collins-based PVHS and released correspondence between the two systems detailing past attempts to cooperate.

PVHS spokesman Kevin Darst said the health system didn’t want to negotiate in the media, but he said PVHS’s plans for a stand-alone west Greeley emergency department and surgery center will move ahead.

{Via The Tribune, read more here}