Trover merges with Baptist, changes name

By Nick Tabor, New Era Senior Staff Writer

Trover Health System officially became a part of Baptist Health, one of Kentucky’s largest health organizations, on Thursday. Its name is now Baptist Health Madisonville.

All of its subsidiary organizations and services are changing to the new name, Trover announced in a news release Thursday morning. This includes the convenient care center at the Hopkinsville Wal-Mart.

Baptist is also changing its name from Baptist Healthcare System. The name “Baptist Health” should “unify its family of services,” according to the release.

“The new brand reflects that the system is much more than a group of hospitals, but a broad variety of health care services and facilities,” the release reads.

Trover announced the merger last year.

The Affordable Care Act meant it would need to care for about 30,000 new indigent patients, while some of its revenue sources decreased, spokeswoman Sara Spencer said in a previous interview with the New Era.

So its board evaluated whether it could continue operating independently.

“Can we stand alone, or are we going to need the support of a formal network?” Spencer explained.

Merging with Baptist gets the Madisonville company access to more doctors, more capital for improvements, better technology and access to other Baptist hospitals and specialists throughout the state, according to the release.

Last year, Trover researched larger medical companies whose networks it could join. It narrowed the list to LifePoint Hospitals Inc., based in Brentwood, Tenn., and Owensboro Medical Health System, according to a previous news release.

Baptist brings deep experience in several critical areas: hospital/clinic ownership and management, relationships with doctors, home health services, occupational health services, health insurance (through its Bluegrass Family Health plans),and wellness programs for businesses, according to the 2011 release.

The six other hospitals in its network are in Louisville, LaGrange, Corbin, Lexington, Paducah and Richmond. It also manages Hardin Memorial Hospital in Elizabethtown, according to its website.

In 2010, one of every six inpatients and eight outpatients in Kentucky received care from a Baptist hospital, according to Thursday’s announcement.

The facility in Madisonville is now recruiting doctors for internal medicine and family practice. Unlike Jennie Stuart Medical Center, most doctors who work with Trover/Baptist are full employees of the company, not independent practitioners who have access to hospital equipment.

It plans renovations to its Mother/Baby Unit, a remodel of its Emergency and Same Day Surgery departments, and updates to its cafeteria, according to the release.