Written by Lindsey Dunn
Marketshare. Physician recruitment. Clout with payers.
Despite the marked increase in collaboration within the industry, huge rivalries persist, especially in the largest urban markets across the country.
Who are the greatest rivalries in healthcare? Here are 10, as selected by our editors and presented in alphabetical order.
Carolinas HealthCare System vs. Novant Health (Charlotte, N.C.). In no market is the battle over inpatient beds hotter than in Charlotte, where 16-hospital Novant Health, actually based in nearby Winston-Salem, and 35-hospital Carolinas control all eight hospitals in Mecklenburg County (where Charlotte is the county seat). Currently, the two are fighting to obtain approval for additional beds in Mecklenburg County, where the state has deemed 40 new beds can be built. Both had submitted proposals to the state, but in April, Carolinas was granted a certificate of need for all 40 beds. Novant is appealing the decision. If the clash is anything like the one for a CON in nearby Fort Mill, S.C. — which involved the two systems and Tenet’s Piedmont Medical Center — don’t expect a quick resolution. The three systems fought each other and the state of its CON decision there for nearly eight years.
While Carolinas, led by Michael Tarwater, is a larger system, Novant’s growth in the last 10 years, led by former CEO Paul Wiles and succeeded by Carl Armato, has been more significant. According to the Charlotte Observer:
“With nearly $7 billion in annual revenue, Carolinas HealthCare runs about 30 hospitals and owns more than $1 billion worth of property in Mecklenburg County alone. It has more than $2 billion in investments. In the five-year period ending in 2011, it spent $1.8 billion on capital projects. Growth at Novant Health, the region’s other major hospital system, has been almost as dramatic.
Novant owns 13 hospitals, including the three Presbyterian hospitals, and has total annual revenue of more than $3 billion. The system had about $1.6 billion in cash and investments in 2010 – a three-fold increase over the decade.”
