The growing trend of large health systems acquiring outpatient imaging centers from radiology groups can create a stressful situation for all parties involved. It can be especially difficult for a radiology group’s leadership to part with what was once a very lucrative arm of the business, but acquisition offers do not grow on trees.

Lee Memorial Health System (LMHS), Fort Myers, Florida, offers a wide range of imaging services at its four acute-care campuses and three outpatient imaging centers, including a host of high-field MRI systems. As Mark Williams, director of outpatient imaging, recalls, however, something was missing. “When we looked at our business model, we saw

This article is the first in a four-part series.

As radiology practices continue to grow in size via mergers, partnerships, and other forms of consolidation, the model of the nationwide practice is beginning to appeal to many. ProScan Imaging (Cincinnati, Ohio) owns 24 freestanding imaging centers in the United States, and it offers teleradiology services both nationally and internationally.

In the wake of the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti, multiple aid groups rushed to the country to provide housing and medical care for the estimated 1.5 to 1.8 million residents displaced by the natural disaster. One such group was Health4Haiti, which had established a presence in the country several years before and had been building a clinic in

The decision to outsource a radiology practice’s billing can be emotionally fraught. Many practices have historically employed sizable in-house billing departments, and though the decision to outsource might appear simple from an economic perspective, when it comes to putting people out of work, administrators understandably blanch. Further, while

Lourdes Hospital in Binghamton, New York, knew that it was losing pediatric MRI patients to a local imaging center with a 0.6T open MRI system, but it wasn’t until the imaging department started collecting data and tracking how many phone calls a day it received inquiring about open MRI that it decided to install an open system alongside its 1.5T

The concept of personal goodwill in the mergers and acquisitions of imaging centers occupies a decidedly intangible realm. John P. Holman, JD, an attorney in the Falls Church, Virginia, office of law firm Reed Smith LLP, has seen negotiations play out largely over the goodwill issue, with patience and persistence sometimes winning.