Medical care in Spokane faces future boldly

Group Health and Providence will cooperate in pursuing the kind of efficient, holistic care envisioned by the Affordable Care Act.

In an unusual partnership, a nonprofit health plan that employs its own doctors is joining with a major Catholic hospital system in the Pacific Northwest to provide more efficient health care services to members of all health plans in the Spokane area.

Seattle-based Group Health Cooperative http://www.ghc.org/ and the 32-hospital Providence Health & Services http://www2.providence.org/Pages/default.aspx announced Wednesday (Aug. 1) that they have formed a joint venture to offer a single delivery network in Spokane to all health plans and employers that want to contract with them.

By Harris Meyer

Full Story: http://crosscut.com/2012/08/03/health-medicine/109843/xxx-providence-group-health-spokane/