Troubled Tenet agrees to sell 6 hospitals

The hospital chain is continuing negotiations to sell six more.

By Katherine Vogt, AMNews staff. Sept. 15, 2003.

Tenet Healthcare Corp. has reached agreements to sell five hospitals in the South and another in Philadelphia as part of the troubled company's effort to streamline and improve operations.

The deals account for six of the 14 hospitals that Tenet previously said it would sell, consolidate or pull out of as part of an ongoing corporate overhaul. The company, which prior to the sales operated 114 hospitals, said two others were being closed and that negotiations for the sale of the remaining six hospitals are ongoing.

Detailed terms of the deals were not disclosed. However, Tenet said it expected $550 million in gross proceeds from its sale of two hospitals in Tennessee, two in Missouri and one in Florida to Health Management Associates Inc., a rural acute care hospital operator

"We are very pleased with this transaction, which is part of our previously announced plan to divest or consolidate a number of hospitals that no longer fit the company's core operating strategy," said Trevor Fetter, Tenet's president and acting chief executive officer, in a written statement.

Health Management Associates said the hospitals combined have 1,061 licensed beds and should generate about $400 million revenue. The Naples, Fla.-based chain will operate a total of 52 hospitals once this sale and another pending transaction are complete.