Hiring challenges help influence hospital to hand radiology reins over to private practice
Hiring challenges have helped influence one east coast hospital to hand the reins of its radiology department over to a local private practice, leaders announced Thursday.
Commonwealth Radiology Associates is expanding its presence in New England, taking over imaging services for York Hospital in southern Maine as of July 1. The deal covers the main facility, several community sites and five walk-in care centers also reaching into New Hampshire.
The “premier private practice” in the region will independently operate York Hospital’s Department of Radiology, retaining any senior hospital staffers who will now be employed by CRA. Billing also will be handled through the practice’s vendor, Healthcare Administrative Partners.
“As our facility faces the many challenges of modern healthcare, such as physician recruitment and retention, we knew we needed a partner with not only the knowledge of radiology, but also the ability to scale,” hospital CEO Patrick Taylor said in a July 6 announcement. “Working with Commonwealth Radiology Associates, an established presence in the region, will allow us the stability we need to offer our patients exceptional service, wherever they choose to receive care at York Hospital.”
Headquartered in Lowell, Massachusetts, CRA also inked a similar partnership with Boston-based Tufts Medical Center in 2021 in a bid to boost recruitment. The practice now provides diagnostic and interventional radiology services across 20 locations in northeastern Massachusetts and employs 65 board-certified physicians. York Hospital, meanwhile, is a 79-bed, independent nonprofit that’s been around since 1906 and has 275 physicians on hand.
Practice President Allan Hoffman, MD, sees such partnerships as pivotal in today’s ever-evolving imaging services marketplace.
“Relationships like this are important as all medical practices navigate the distinctive challenges of today’s healthcare environment,” he said in the announcement. “CRA looks forward to this endeavor and working side by side with our new York Hospital colleagues.”
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.