Health care executives here anticipate positive changes and decent, if subdued, growth in their industry in the coming year, despite a still-unsettled landscape in the wake of the federal Affordable Care Act that is sparking new alliances and fostering greater patient-focused collaboration.

In one example of how the sector remains in a state of constant change, Providence Health & Services, which includes Spokane-based Providence Health Care, the Inland Northwest’s large provider network, is preparing to merge with a larger network.

It has reached an agreement with another Catholic-based health system, St. Joseph Health, to combine into a single network that would span from Anchorage, Alaska, to Lubbock, Texas. Plans for that merger are expected to be firmed up early next year.

In another example, national health-insurance giant Kaiser Permanente announced earlier this month that it has agreed to acquire Group Health Cooperative, the Seattle-based insurer that covers about 113,000 people in Eastern Washington. That acquisition, assuming it clears regulatory and other hurdles, is expected to take a year to complete. 

Despite the myriad of changes, Elaine Couture, CEO of Providence Health Care, says, “For us, 2016 looks very, very promising.”

She says, “Net revenue is pretty flat, but our volumes are up,” including admissions and surgeries, by about 6.4 percent and 7.5 percent, respectively. Also, care for which Providence isn’t compensated is down, due to more people now being insured, thanks to health care reform, she says.

Overall, Providence Health Care continues to focus more on health care accessibility and affordability—and less on acute care—than in the past, Couture says.

She says the performance of its Providence Medical Park multispecialty center in Spokane Valley, which it opened in April 2014 and has enhanced with additional services since then, “is exceeding our expectations in terms of our business plan, so we’re very pleased with it.”

Couture says she’s excited about the looming merger with St. Joseph Health, which she expects to have little impact here, other than the additional resources that will become available through joining with a larger, but philosophically similar network.

Maurine Cate, CEO of Deaconess Hospital and chief strategy officer for the Spokane-based Rockwood Health System, says, “I think volume is going to continue to grow, not hugely. I think there’s a lot of social factors that are contributing to that as well as health issues.”

She says, “I think what we’re going to see next year is more integration in physical and behavioral health in bringing in all community resources, not just traditional providers,” to address perceived gaps in health care access, particularly involving mental health.

Rockwood Health System is nearing completion of a new $10.2 million Deaconess Hospital North freestanding emergency department, on a 6-acre site at 8202 N. Division, and Cate says she is excited about the enhanced services that facility will enable Rockwood to provide on Spokane’s North Side.

Nancy Vorhees, chief operating officer at Spokane-based Inland Northwest Health Services, which now employs more than 1,100 people and provides a range of health care-related services, says, “2015 was a good year for INHS, so as we look at 2016, we’re really looking at much the same. We anticipate next year is going to remain fairly consistent.” 

She says she foresees continued provider collaboration aimed at improving access and convenience for patients, such as INHS’ joint participation with other providers and entities here in the areas of occupational medicine and physical fitness.

Tom Messick, vice president and general manager of big health insurer Premera Blue Cross’ Spokane office and claims operations here, among other regional responsibilities, is optimistic about the coming year.

“In general, we’re up. We’re at the highest membership that we’ve ever been, and we’re seeing significant growth in employer segments small and midmarket-size employers especially.”

Premera currently employs more than 700 people here.

“With market growth and our increase in revenue, we feel confident for the coming year,” Messick says.

Steve Duvoisin, CEO for several companies here that operate under the Inland Imaging umbrella, says, “I see continued growth in that organization over the coming years, mainly because of the consolidation in health care.”

In the current health care environment, he says, “There is an increasing role for imaging and a deeper integration with the rest of the health care system.”

However, that growth probably will be muted. Through its imaging centers, Inland Imaging currently sees about 280,000 to 300,000 patients a year, and he anticipates that volume growing about 1 percent a year for the foreseeable future.

That’s due, he says, to two conflicting forces—one involving the cost-cutting push to not overutilizes health care services, which could reduce imaging volume, and the other involving the maxim that “as we get older, we appropriately need more imaging services.”

Duvoisin says, “We’re continuing to figure out how to be more productive. We don’t see layoffs in our future. We look at being able to do more work with the same amount of staff.”

—Kim Crompton