Multi-Million Dollar Sale of Vermont Dialysis Clinics Abandoned

BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) — A New Hampshire company has withdrawn plans to buy five outpatient dialysis clinics from Fletcher Allen Health Care in the face of potential opposition from the state of Vermont.

Interim hospital president Dr. John Brumsted said Monday that Fletcher Allen will now seek to raise its charges for dialysis services.

Bio-Medical Applications of New Hampshire withdrew its application to buy the clinics after the commissioner of the Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration, issued a draft decision rejecting the company’s application to buy the clinics for nearly $29 million.

BISHCA commissioner Stephen Kimbell said he had concerns about issues of pricing, access and quality of care. Kimball also questioned whether he should allow a regulated nonprofit hospital to sell a key state health service to an unregulated private company.

Fletcher Allen had planned to sell centers in South Burlington, St. Albans, Berlin, Rutland and Newport, which it said are operating at a loss.

Hospital officials said Monday that although they disagreed with Kimbell, they would not appeal his decision. Brumsted said they hoped to meet with the commissioner to discuss Fletcher Allen’s options.

“As we will not absorb continuing operating deficits in this service line, we would like to meet with you, before filing the application, to review the various options we are considering in the wake of your decision to make our dialysis services sustainable in the future,” Brumsted said in a letter.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.

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Posted by jcashman on Dec 20 2011. Filed under Business, Featured - For home page featured article. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry