Skip to playerSkip to main content
July 25th it was announced health provider Ascension will sell 9 hospitals in the state of Illinois. This follows a trend of massive asset liquidation from the outfit, accused of large scale corruption in its business practices and under possible federal investigation for a number of issues. This follows news in June that large numbers of hospital staff walked out and resigned in the Chicago area after non-profit Ascension decided to outsource staff through a private equity firm.

June 25th it was announced UAB (University Of Alabama At Birmingham) Health System will acquire Ascension St. Vincent’s hospitals in north central Alabama in fall 2024 for an estimated $450 million dollars.

“UAB is hopeful that most – if not all – of Ascension St. Vincent’s roughly 5,000 caregivers and associates will remain in their roles,” said UAB spokesperson Alicia Rohan.

UAB and Ascension St. Vincent’s have had an operating agreement since 2020. Rohan said UAB Health System plans to operate the hospitals without any changes and has no plans to eliminate or consolidate services.

This comes 1 month following a cyberattack on Ascension that operates in 19 US states with 140 hospitals, 160000+ associates & 36000+ affiliated providers.

My analysis is there are more questions than answers provided in this announcement. There may be behind the scenes factors involved that have not been made public as to their motive in selling. One possibilty is Ascension was ordered to sell their assets and leave Alabama. If my experience as a patient is any indication there are many service related claims against the hospital. The timing on the announcement is suspicious: June 25th is a week before the 4th of July holiday, making this a news story that people potentially will forget about by the time July 8th rolls around and everyone returns to work.
The health care market in Central Alabama is a pure growth concern, demand is only increasing as are profits across the board. Ascension St. Vincent's enjoys a majority share of business as a health provider in Central / Eastern Jefferson County at the time of the sale. They are selling the above assets at basically pennies on the dollar. Just an example: The annual revenue for 2022 for ONE of the FIVE hospitals being sold is $498 million dollars.

#ascension #patientdumping #emtala #birminghamradiologicalgroup #vulcanimagingassociates #misdiagnosis #medicalfraud
Transcript
00:00All right, as always, you can go to YouTube channel My Medical Nightmare and see 40 plus
00:07hours video on everything that happened to me. After a devastating cyber attack hit the computer
00:14systems of major U.S. health provider Ascension, 19 states, 140 hospitals, 160,000 associates,
00:2336,000 affiliated providers. Now, an interesting thing has happened in the public discourse
00:31following this cyber attack. As you can see, in over 60 to 60 hours of video documentation,
00:40recorded phone calls, uploaded medical records, and correspondence between Ascension, its affiliates,
00:48its partners, etc. on this YouTube channel. Ascension is a bad business. They're rife with
00:56corruption. They're responsible for damage to countless numbers of people. All right, July 25,
01:032024. Ascension's sell-off of assets continues. Word on the street is there are federal investigations
01:12into Ascension. It's going to be one of the biggest health care fraud cases in U.S. history.
01:20According to the Chicago Tribune newspaper, it was announced that Ascension is selling nine
01:27hospitals in the state of Illinois to California-based prime health care. According to the article,
01:36that's more than half of the hospitals Ascension operates in that state. The third largest city
01:42in America, Chicago, is located there. The price of the deal, not disclosed. University of
01:49Alabama at Birmingham, UAB, recently announced their intent to buy several large hospitals located
01:56around Birmingham, Alabama. A figure of $450 million was printed in the media. This falls news
02:05published by Crain's Chicago business newspaper in June of this year that following Ascension Illinois'
02:14decision to outsource hospitalist staff at 10 of its Chicago area hospitals to a private equity-backed
02:24staffing firm, more than one-third of those doctors and clinicians have left the organization.
02:32They estimate around 35 percent of the 110 full and part-time workers, including medical directors,
02:40doctors, physicians, assistants, walked away from Ascension when the outsourcing transition started
02:47on June 1st. Since hospitalists were first notified of the labor transition in January, some have been
02:55concerned about SEP Health's private equity ownership, a fact they have said will lead to larger patient
03:03caseloads at some Ascension hospitals as proposed under the staffing firm's contracts as it seeks to grow
03:11revenues. Hospitalists who previously spoke to Crain's argued more patient per provider and other changes
03:19of staffing models could worsen patient care quality. Hospitalists also stood to take pay cuts
03:27under SEP Health's contracts. The Chicago Medical Society, which represents more than 17,000 local physicians
03:38and the Illinois Nurses Association, raised concerns over this deal. It looks as if Ascension is trying to beat
03:48a hasty retreat. They're rushing to the exits. And one possibility here is that Ascension was in fact
03:57ordered to sell its assets and leave the marketplace. Others have accused Ascension of
04:05pumping dumps. They'll swoop into an area, buy up a group of hospitals and medical practices,
04:13and proceed to bleed them dry. Business ethics, medical ethics, morals and the law go on the back burner,
04:23an afterthought in the pure pursuit of amassing money and power. They start running into trouble
04:30with regulators and the law. They quickly sell off the hospitals and doctors. All right, so what's led to
04:38all the problems for Ascension? My own case dealing with this hospital as a patient, what I found was
04:46after I was misdiagnosed by Ascension doctors and employees, I found I had a life-threatening
04:55broken skull injury. Took this issue back to Ascension, the radiologists, etc. They denied any injury
05:04pre-existed in their own images and that would not help me get those analyses re-read and reversed.
05:14So trying to establish the truth of my injury from the outset, it became a pissing contest.
05:22And I think instances such as this, this is how Ascension is really running afoul.
05:28Because they do this to a couple different people, they're going to have quite a few bills and risk
05:34piling up. And I'll share my phone call to Ascension CEO Joseph Mpichike, outlining my own issues.
05:43You've reached the Ascension System Office General Mailbox. After the tone, leave a detailed message
05:48and someone will respond to your call. Thank you.
05:54I'm trying to reach CEO Joseph Mpichike, and he can contact me at that number.
06:00And I have a message that I would like to give to Ascension.
06:04Between 2018 and 2019, I was an emergency department patient at Ascension St. Vincent's East Hospital
06:11in Birmingham, Alabama. I believe I had broken my neck. I had an x-ray, two CT scans, and later an MRI
06:19looked at by Ascension St. Vincent's doctors. Each time they had told me I had no injuries in this area,
06:27I knew their diagnosis was an error as my condition worsened. The area became infected and infested with parasites.
06:35By summer 2019, I almost died. I obtained my medical records from your hospital along with the x-ray
06:41CT MRI imagery and discovered the truth of my injury. I had broken bone in the underside of my skull
06:48in the area of the condylar canal and occipital condyle. How the doctors could admit such a large
06:54and serious injury over multiple hospital visits is inexcusable. I believe some element of organized
06:59corruption may exist in this hospital. I have compiled over 10 hours of video documentation on
07:06what happened to me on my YouTube channel. And the name of the channel is My Medical Nightmare.
07:12I believe I may have been a victim of patient dumping in the course of my seeking treatment,
07:19which is a violation of EMTALA, E-M-T-A-L-A. When I told medical staff associated with Ascension about
07:26my discovery that I had been misdiagnosed repeatedly, I was personally attacked and my psychological state
07:34was challenged. And this is reflected in medical records I obtained later. I could not obtain proper
07:40treatment or diagnosis for this injury because doctors and nurses that I would subsequently have
07:49encounters with would only entertain what the erroneous Ascension ER findings were. My mother,
07:55who was a nurse for 20 years, had the misfortune of working in an Ascension hospital. When I questioned
08:02my MRR findings involving St. Vincent's Ambulatory Healthcare Network, LLC, and Dr. Michael Brandt
08:09Ruff, MD, radiologist, in March 2019. My mother, who was a nurse for 20 years and worked in the Ascension
08:16hospital, she was terminated from her job there around the same time. And so this phone call, I
08:23challenged the misdiagnosis of Ascension St. Vincent's East Hospital, Birmingham, Alabama, and I
08:30challenged the policy of this hospital. And Mr. Impeachike, I think you need to look into this,
08:37please. Please listen to my message, look into what I'm saying, and you're free to contact me. Thank you.
Comments

Recommended