Health Inventures Expands OhioHealth Collaboration to Include Sleep Services

BOULDER, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Health Inventures, a surgical and physician services company, announced today that it has taken over the management role for the OhioHealth Sleep Services Network, effective March 2012.

OhioHealth Sleep Services is a partnership between OhioHealth and community physicians that operates 11 sleep centers in Columbus, Ohio. The partnership will

Provide the sleep center network with the high level of professional management that Health Inventures currently provides to the OhioHealth ASC network. Drive operational synergies between the ASCs and the sleep centers to include increased patient access to care. Continue to grow OhioHealth Sleep Services, building on its successful track record.

"OhioHealth Sleep Services is excited to partner with Health Inventures to operate our delivery network,” said Richard Irene, M.D., President of OhioHealth Sleep Services. “Health Inventures’ operational expertise and track record of successfully managing OhioHealth’s physician-hospital joint ventured surgery centers will translate well to our sleep services.”

“Our longstanding partnership with OhioHealth is very important to Health Inventures,” said Chuck Peck M.D., president and chief executive officer of Health Inventures. “We are excited to expand our partnership into Sleep Services. “Our goal is to grow with our partners and evolve so that we are continuously adding to their ability to deliver more effective services. Optimizing physician-hospital partnerships is the most important value we bring to our customers, and ultimately, their patients. This unique ability is critical in many areas of healthcare delivery beyond our historical ASC business and is essential to our customers’ future success.”

Health Inventures will also employ all of the sleep center and ASC network employees through its Employee Management Solutions company.

About Health Inventures

Health Inventures is a surgical and physician services company driving financial and clinical performance through physician-hospital alignment. Founded in 1995, the company has guided hundreds of clients through the complexities of launching and operating surgical facilities, improving teamwork and workflows, controlling costs and increasing efficiencies, and achieving well-defined clinical and revenue-focused goals through a variety of interconnected solutions, such as ambulatory surgery center (ASC) development and operations, physician practice management, hospital perioperative and anesthesia performance improvement, and human resources advisory and employment services. Health Inventures’ surgical facility network produces clinical outcomes, patient and physician satisfaction, and financial performance above industry standards. The company is privately held and located near Boulder, Colo. For more information, visit www.healthinventures.com.

About OhioHealth Sleep Services

OhioHealth Sleep Services provide a safe, compassionate environment where sleep disorders are diagnosed and effective treatment recommended. The Sleep Services network runs 11 centers across the greater Columbus, Ohio region. The OhioHealth Sleep Services network is affiliated to OhioHealth, a not-for-profit network of hospitals that has been serving patients since 1891.

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Health mandate to include birth control

This is a great step forward for the health of all women

The Obama administration recently ruled that health insurance plans must include contraception among the preventive services available to women without deductibles or co-pays under the new health-care law [“Contraception mandate outrages religious groups,” Health, seattletimes.com, Feb. 3].

This decision does not force doctors to prescribe contraception, or a woman to use it. Instead, it makes contraception affordable for many women who otherwise would not be able to afford it. As a nurse, I know this is a great step forward for the health of all women.

Despite the fact that 98 percent of Catholic women use contraception, some in the religious community are demanding that the current exemption for churches and religious organizations be expanded to include colleges, hospitals and social service agencies. This would be a disastrous decision for women’s health.

This issue goes to the heart of the personal-health decisions a woman makes with her doctor and care team, not her employer. As a Catholic, my grandmother died giving birth to her eighth child in so many years, and my mother had 10 pregnancies within less than 12 years. With birth control, their pregnancies could have been spaced so as to minimize the extreme physical, emotional, financial and psychological toll placed upon our family.

As a nurse, I know the decision not to expand the exception was the right one — as a matter of public health, respect for individual conscience and simple fairness to Washington women and their families.

This politicalizing from the pulpit, however, is one of the reasons why I struggle with my Catholic faith.

— Mary McNaughton, registered nurse, Everett

This is a threat to our fundamental freedoms

The recent news about the Health and Human Services mandate gives one something to, shall we say, pause over. I find this move very interesting. For those of us who are disturbed by this mandate, the issue is not simply abortion; it is that our government, while arguing that it is defending a woman’s right to choose, this mandate is going to deny that same right of conscience to those of us, men and women, who believe that all life is sacred, from conception to natural death..

The government, according to our founding documents, lacks the legitimacy, or the power to do what is being threatened by the Health and Human Services Mandate. It does not have the competency to do so.

The disagreement between us in this matter is about much more than just the life issues. We disagree on fundamental Constitutional, democratic principles. The right of conscience applies to all moral, political and social justice issues, not just the life issues. That is why this is, and will continue to be, a legitimate debate, not a forgone conclusion.

This is not just a mandate, it is a mortal threat to fundamental freedoms. You give government this kind of power and you no longer live in a democracy.

— Daniel J. Doyle, Edmonds

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