SHARON, Pa. – Buoyed by a commitment of an $11 million loan from community organizations, Tenor Health Foundation Sharon LLC and Sharon Regional Medical Center are back in business.
Rising from the ashes of the Steward Health Care System bankruptcy, Sharon Regional and Tenor Health have brought back most of the health services to the hospital, as well as more than 575 employees.
The change of ownership was completed in Mid-May, which allows Tenor to begin billing Medicare and Medicaid for services, thus bringing income back into the nonprofit hospital.
Radha Savitala, Tenor Health CEO, said the hospital has agreements with many major insurance providers again.
Savitala, other hospital administration members and Rod Wilt, executive director of Penn-Northwest Development Corp., provided an update May 15 on the hospital, which reopened March 18, as well as plans going forward.
Sharon Regional again is providing emergency room services, the Wound Care Center, surgical services, therapeutic radiology, fluoroscopy and behavioral health for adults and children. Savitala said the cardiac catheterization lab is operating, and work is ongoing to obtain licensure to again offer the level of cardiac services for which the hospital was once known. Additional beds are being put into service as patient levels dictate.
The May 15 presentation included a ceremonial commitment check for the $11 million loan. Wilt said $9.2 million of the funds was raised through the community.
The Buhl Health Foundation was the largest contributor, with $6 million. The Community Foundation of Western PA and Eastern Ohio committed $1.5 million. The city of Sharon contributed a $500,000 grant from American Rescue Plan Act funds, and the Sharon Industrial Development Authority contributed $350,000 toward the loan. Penn-Northwest Development Corp. provided $350,000, as did the city of Farrell. Hermitage added $250,000.
Additional funding came through the Shenango Valley Enterprise Zone.
The hospital’s payroll and benefits cost about $3 million per month alone.
Although the hospital’s landlord, Medical Properties Trust, has agreed to delay rent payments, they are expected to begin again once the hospital is collecting Medicare and Medicaid billing. Billing procedures can mean delays of 30 to 60, or even 90, days.
Wilt said Tenor realized that the previous owners were leaving money on the table by not collecting or billing some services properly, something Savitala’s team is addressing.
Sharon Regional, which closed Jan. 6 during Steward’s bankruptcy process, is the first hospital in the commonwealth to close and reopen, according to Val Hennessy, chief clinical officer at Sharon Regional.
“We made history in Pennsylvania,” Hennessy said. “Every leader in this room that you’re sitting with made that happen with the Tenor family. I’m so grateful to everybody. … I was born here, went to school here. I’ve seen many relatives and friends pass away here. To reopen this hospital and be a part of it is just an absolute honor and a privilege.”
Three members of the newly formed Tenor Health Foundation board are also from the area: Wilt; Bob Fiscus, Sharon city manager; and Dr. Robert Piston, a local orthopedic surgeon who will provide local and medical insight. Savitala and Jerry Seelig, who works with Tenor Health and provides consulting services to troubled health care providers, are also on the board.
Two other local hospitals that were previously owned by Steward and acquired by Insight Health System – the former Trumbull Regional Medical Center in Warren and former Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Howland – closed in March. Butch Eavenson, Sharon Regional CEO, said Tenor has been able to offer jobs to some of the displaced workers and physicians, including Dr. Penelope Mashburn, who is now leading the general surgical team at the Sharon hospital.
Tenor also has been able to restart the residency program that operated at the Trumbull hospital through Western Reserve Health Education, offering 72 residents the space for classes and opportunities to work alongside physicians at Sharon Regional. WRHE had been offering residency training since 1903, and Eavenson said it’s exciting to be able to continue the program.
Savitala said the volume of patients continues to increase, which is leading to more staffing and more services being reopened, which should bring in additional revenue.
The hospital is nonprofit, which makes it eligible for additional funding sources. It needs money to make long overdue repairs.
Wilt said the hospital is waiting for approval for up to $10 million in matching grant dollars through the Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program from Pennsylvania, which would help with making repairs. Savitala quipped that the staff has gotten very good at determining the source of leaky water pipes and shutting them off to prevent major damage.
The eventual goal, besides providing quality health care for the community, according to Wilt, is to purchase the hospital real estate from MPT.
The $11 million loan package being overseen by Penn-Northwest is the largest ever provided for economic development in Mercer County, according to Wilt, who also said that investing so much into one project is a calculated risk by all the entities involved.
“In nearly all cases, they are not taxpayer dollars,” Wilt said of the funding sources. “They are for the explicit purpose of revitalizing this community, and where you start with revitalizing the community is protecting the assets and the employment that is here,” he said. “We cannot afford to have anybody else leave this area. We need to attract people in this area, and health care is part of that backbone of infrastructure.”
Wilt said that without high quality higher education and health care, rebuilding Mercer County can’t happen.
Pictured at top: Tenor CEO Radha Savitala.