Providence Health & Services, the five-state health system that includes Spokane-based Providence Health Care, is in talks with another Catholic health system, St. Joseph Health, to combine into a single network that would reach from Anchorage, Alaska, to Lubbock, Texas.

The two health systems say they have signed a letter of intent to merge, although discussions still are in the early stages and details of the partnership haven’t been finalized. Those discussions are expected to continue over the next several months.

The merger reportedly would be the largest ever for Providence Health & Services, which also made news in the Puget Sound area a few years ago when it formed an alliance with Seattle-based Swedish Health Services, another big provider there.

For now, it’s unclear what impact—if any—the merger would have on Providence Health Care, the Inland Northwest’s largest health care network that includes Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center & Children’s Hospital and Providence Holy Family Hospital, both in Spokane.

However, Health Care Inc. Northwest, a health news website operated by the Puget Sound Business Journal and Portland Business Journal, quoted a Providence Health & Services executive in a recent post as saying the transaction wouldn’t have any impact on Providence’s patients, nor on the care it provides in the Puget Sound area.

In addition to Sacred Heart, Holy Family, and the recently opened Providence Medical Park multispecialty center in Spokane Valley, Providence Health Care includes smaller critical-access hospitals in Colville and Chewelah, three urgent care centers and home health, assisted-living, adult day health, and skilled-nursing facilities and services. 

Providence Medical Group, the physician division of Providence Health Care, includes more than 650 primary-care, specialty-care, and hospital-based providers serving patients throughout the region. Altogether, Providence Health Care entities employ more than 7,000 people.

Neither Elaine Couture, CEO of the nonprofit Catholic-sponsored system here, nor Dr. Rod Hochman, president and CEO of Renton, Wash.-based Providence Health & Services, could be reached immediately for comment. Providence communications office representatives deflected Journal requests for interviews, saying the executives had little information to provide beyond what was included in a press release the two hospital systems issued about their merger talks and the letter of intent.

In the press release, Hochman said, “Providence and St. Joseph Health’s missions are aligned to improve the quality of care, increase access, and make care more affordable for everyone.”

Deborah Proctor, president and CEO of Irvine, Calif.-based St. Joseph Health, said in the press release, “We are two mission-focused organizations which truly have the potential of being better together, delivering outstanding clinical care and providing a compassionate presence in all the communities we serve.”

In additional to sharing common missions, Providence and St. Joseph Health share similar heritages, the release noted. Although St. Joseph was established only 33 years ago, its roots date back to 1912 when a handful of Midwestern religious women, who became the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange, traveled across the country to open a school and eventually a small hospital in the lumber town of Eureka, Calif. It eventually grew to serve other parts of the state, as well as communities in Texas and New Mexico.

Similarly, nearly 160 years ago, the Sisters of Providence voyaged from Montreal to Fort Vancouver, Wash., to launch health care services in the Northwest, eventually growing their organization to serve Washington, Oregon, Montana, California, and Alaska, the release said.

Although the two systems serve different communities, they noted in the press release that together they form a contiguous geographical service area. They also said that both systems include non-Catholic health care affiliates “that share a mission to care for everyone, especially those who are poor and vulnerable, and that they have maintained their original faith tradition or secular status, as well as their brands and rich heritage traditions.”

Providence Health & Services appears to be more than twice as large as St. Joseph Health, statistically speaking. Its system includes 34 hospitals, 475 physician clinics, senior services, supportive housing, and many other health and education services. Together with its affiliates, it employs more than 76,000 people across the five states it serves. 

Counting its affiliates, it says on its website that it last year had total net income of $771 million on total net operating revenue of $12 billion last year, and it listed its total net assets at $7.9 billion. It says it recorded community benefit and charity care costs of $848 million.

By comparison, the St. Joseph Health system includes 16 hospitals, physician organizations, home health agencies, hospice care, skilled nursing facilities, clinics, outpatient services, and community outreach services, and it employs about 25,000 people. 

St. Joseph doesn’t list net income figures on its website but says it had total revenue of $5.6 billion last year and that it recorded community benefit costs of $416.4 million.

Providence Health & Services announced four years ago that it planned to consolidate and relocate its billing functions in Spokane, adding that it expected as part of that plan to add more than 150 jobs to its service center here. Although its headquarters are on the west side of the state, it said it selected Spokane because of the Providence ministries located in Eastern Washington, customer accessibility, availability of labor and community resources, convenient transportation, and lower costs for labor and facilities.

The Spokane hub of Providence’s Revenue Cycle Management, it said, would focus on billing and follow-up with commercial providers such as Premera, Group Health, and Regence, as well as business functions such as cash posting and patient correspondence.

Providence Health & Services was established formally on Jan. 1, 2006, when Spokane-based Providence Services, the parent company of Providence Health Care, merged with Seattle-based affiliate Providence Health System.

Providence Health Care, originally named Providence Services Eastern Washington (PSEW), was formed in 1998 when six hospitals operating under the Providence Services umbrella joined together formally under a single corporation.

Aside from Sacred Heart, those hospitals include Spokane’s Holy Family Hospital; St. Mary Medical Center, in Walla Walla; and hospitals in Deer Park, Chewelah, and Colville that, together with Holy Family, made up the Dominican Network, named after the Dominican Sisters who founded the health care ministry. The Deer Park hospital has since closed.

The Dominican Network became part of Providence Services in 1993, when the Dominican Sisters transferred sponsorship of the network to the Sisters of Providence.