Putting the hospital on the market during a global pandemic is not what local officials envisioned last year when they announced exploring partnership and sale options for NHRMC.
 
But while the coronavirus outbreak has affected recent meeting schedules, it has not yet pushed back recommendation deadlines or impacted potential suitors’ pitches, officials said.
 
“We basically are all doing our homework right now. We’re waiting for some of the clarifying questions so that we have even more information. And we’re expecting to look at May and June as far as our timeline to come up with that recommendation,” Barb Biehner, co-chair of the 21-member Partnership Advisory Group (PAG), said about reviewing six proposals from health systems interested in partnering with or buying NHRMC. (Click here for more on those proposals.)
 
That recommendation is PAG’s goal to forward a short list of the proposals – two or three, based on its charter – to county commissioners and hospital trustees for starting the negotiation process. Ultimately any deal with another health system, if one is negotiated, would be up to the commissioners and hospital trustees to approve or not.
 
Two of the county commissioners who voted to explore proposals – Woody White and Pat Kusek – are not running for re-election in November, meaning that if the process were to extend into next year a different five-member board would be in place to vote on a deal.
 
The Partnership Advisory Group, which includes hospital trustees, NHRMC medical staff and other community members, has been meeting since Oct. 29 to evaluate the hospital’s ownership model. Part of that evaluation has been to issue a request for proposals to outside health systems interested in NHRMC. Other meetings have focused on ways to maintain independent control but possibly restructure to address what hospital officials say are limitations to its existing setup as a county-owned hospital.
 
The group asked the six responding health systems if they were still interested in pursuing a potential relationship with NHRMC given COVID-19 and if they saw any financial impacts on their ability to fulfill their proposals, New Hanover Regional President and CEO John Gizdic said.
 
“What we heard across the board was they remained committed to pursuing a partnership with our organization, while still obviously addressing COVID in their organization for the markets that they’re in,” Gizdic said. “And they also reaffirmed their capability to execute on what they had in their proposals given their strong balance sheet, given the fact that the majority of them are double-A [credit] rated and the depth and breadth of talent and resources they have within their systems.”
 
The idea of possibly selling the county-owned hospital has met opposition from some since the idea of exploring NHRMC’s model was first announced last summer. A group that has formed around that opposition – Save Our Hospital – last week called for a six-month delay in the process because of the coronavirus outbreak.
 
“Any changes to NHRMC must be done in an environment of full community participation and careful, thoughtful, thorough deliberation with all facts, proposals, and perspectives shared and fully vetted. The current environment allows neither full community participation nor careful deliberation,” states a letter from the Save Our Hospital group. (Click here to read the full statement.)
 
In recent weeks, hospital officials have spoken about the financial strain the coronavirus has placed on NHRMC and other health systems – both for treatment and supplies preparations but also because elective procedures were shut down in anticipation of potential COVID-19 patients.
 
The Save Our Hospital group pointed to those strains, both on NHRMC and on the six entities that submitted proposals, as another reason to hold off on the process.
 
Biehner and Gizdic have pointed to the COVID-19 crisis as an example of how New Hanover Regional would be helped by partnering with a larger health system rather than weathering the losses and preparations on its own.
 
“The conversation of delaying right now is borderline ridiculous,” said Spence Broadhurst, the PAG’s other co-chair. “I think it is so critical that we keep moving forward because our health care providers are on the frontline doing their job. They do not need the prolonged distraction of this. They do not need this any more than the rest of the community does.
 
“We need to get our job done as we’ve been doing, and we’re in position to do that,” he added. “We need to move this forward.”
 
A public hearing is required under state law on the submitted proposals. Officials said they are looking at how to hold one with the current social distancing rules in place.
 
Meanwhile, Gizdic said, the public can review the six proposals released Tuesday and submit comments through the email [email protected].
 
“The PAG reviews those consistently and continuously so there’s the opportunity always for the public to provide the comments via the email,” Gizdic said. “And then we will absolutely, per state statute, have a public hearing before any final decisions or recommendations are made by the county commissioners. That’s really just a matter of when and how we’re able to do that given restrictions and social distancing.”