HonorHealth is assuming operational control of multiple Steward Health hospitals and outpatient facilities, following the healthcare company's bankruptcy filing, the CEO announced Wednesday.
Todd LaPorte, CEO of HonorHealth, stated that effective immediately, the following facilities would be impacted: Mountain Vista Medical Center in Mesa, St. Luke’s Hospital in Tempe, Steward Mesa Hospital – Emergency Room, Florence Hospital in Florence, and multiple outpatient physician practices. The most notable absence from that list? St. Luke's Behavioral Health Center in Phoenix.
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The mental health hospital in downtown Phoenix has been under severe scrutiny for over a month, amid the Arizona State Department of Health Services investigation into its HVAC failure, health code violations, and subsequent shutdown of the facility.
When asked about St. Luke's BHC in Phoenix, LaPorte explained, "We were never asked to assume the management responsibilities for that facility. It was understood that they had a more national strategy for what to do with behavioral health facilities throughout the steward national footprint."
More than 1,000 Steward Health employees at the facilities HonorHealth is absorbing are expected to transition to become employees of the new ownership group. LaPorte shared that HonorHealth plans to assume full operational ownership by October 1st.
"During the interim management period we will have access to all of those employees, with the expectation that when we assume full operational control, although we have authority during this interim period as it relates to the use of those employees, we would expect to assume those employees into the HonorHealth payroll family."
St. Luke's Behavioral Health Center employees in Phoenix will likely not be a part of that deal, as the mental health hospital is the only Steward Health-owned hospital in Arizona not on the list of facilities to be acquired.
Employees at St. Luke's in Phoenix reached out to ABC15 to share internal news of the hospital closing down, following the furlough of its more than 200 employees in August. We reached out to Steward Health for confirmation, but a spokesperson responded and stated that they could not comment on the status of the facility at this time.
