Trinity Mother Frances Hospitals and Clinics board members, clergy, members of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth and hospital staff listen as Dr. Steve Keuer, TMFHC president and Chief Medical Officer, left, talks about plans Thursday for a partnership with Irving-based Christus Health on the hospital campus in Tyler. A letter of intent for the partnership was signed Wednesday and the two entities are working to finalize the plans to expand faith-based health care in the East Texas region, officials with both parties said. Andrew D. Brosig/Tyler Morning Telegraph

1. Christus Trinity Mother Frances executive Lindsey Bradley to retire

Trinity Mother Frances Hospitals and Clinics announced Thursday it will become part of Christus Health, a faith-based, not-for-profit health system based in Irving.

The letter of intent was signed Wednesday, and administrators now are working to finalize the merger by the end of spring.

When the deal is final, four Trinity Mother Frances representatives will join the Christus Health board. This would include Lindsey Bradley, president and CEO, and Ray Thompson, executive vice president and chief operating officer, along with one representative from the Trinity Clinic, and one sister from Trinity Mother Frances’ sponsoring congregation, the Catholic order of the Sisters of The Holy Family of Nazareth.

The Catholic order of the Sisters of The Holy Family of Nazareth will become a third sponsoring congregation of Christus Health, in addition to its two founding sponsoring congregations, the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word of Houston and the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word of San Antonio. 

Officials said more details about the partnership would be announced later during due diligence. They gave no definite response about changes in Trinity Mother Frances’ facility names or its branding, stating they’d make those decisions during the next few months. 

Administrators also are mulling what this partnership would mean for current employees.

“There will be changes, but I can’t describe those changes,” Bradley said. “Overall we think that there will be a growth in jobs.”

Trinity Mother Frances is one of the largest employers in East Texas, with more than 4,000 employees. Christus has about 35,000 employees, with 50 hospitals and 175 clinics in Texas, Arkansas, Iowa, Louisiana, New Mexico, Georgia, Mexico and Chile.

“This is truly a milestone event for Christus Health but also Catholic health care in East Texas,” said Ernie Sadau, CEO at Christus Health.

“And (it gives) the ability of our organizations to work together, to continue to expand health care, to continue to expand the access for all those in need; to focus on the wellness side. Together, these organizations bring over 230 years of experience based in Texas. We understand Texas.”

 

A DIFFERENT APPROACH

Bradley touted Trinity Mother Frances’ legacy in Tyler as the first to provide care for East Texans.

“In 1937 in East Texas, there were no hospitals,” Bradley said. “It was the first hospital in East Texas and over the years there have been a number of firsts.”

This includes the first air ambulance, heart hospital and neonatal intensive care unit.

But to continue the growth and become more innovative, officials said they needed a different approach. They said there is a greater need for primary care providers to address chronic illness here and encourage more preventive care.

“We know that our customers and our businesses and the government can’t afford what we’re doing, so we have to think of new ways to organize ourselves so we can serve people in a bigger and better way,” Bradley said. “We have to learn how to sustain wellness instead of only being here when they’re sick and showing up in our emergency department.”

The larger hospital system would help them to provide more facilities and other resources. 

 “We were planning to grow,” said Darin Szilagyi, chief strategy and business development officer at Trinity Mother Frances Hospitals and Clinics.  “We can grow faster with the partnership of Christus. They bring some resources to the table that allows us to expand quickly, whether it’s project managers to build buildings or it’s recruiters to recruit the physicians. Our infrastructure didn’t have the capacity to grow as quickly as East Texas has asked us to grow.”

Administrators had been planning over the past year and a half an in-depth strategic plan to address changes in health care. During the past nine months, they were identifying with whom they could partner.

Dr. Scott Smith, senior vice president and institute chief of primary care, said Trinity Mother Frances had a list of 20 must-haves, including maintaining a Catholic-based heritage, maintaining a relationship with Trinity Clinic, growing independent relationships with independent physicians, and helping with growing the capital funding plan.

Dr. Steven Keuer, chief medical officer at Trinity Mother Frances Hospitals and Clinics and president of Trinity Clinic, said administrators evaluated many proposals before narrowing their choice to Christus Health. Christus already had an East Texas strategy, with facilities located from Texarkana to Atlanta.

A cultural assessment helped make the final decision.

“There was a good match of mission, vision and values,” Keuer said.

Over 15 months, Trinity Mother Frances officials recruited 33 new primary care physicians, nurse practitioners and physician assistants to prepare for the growth.

Two new clinics already are slated to open: one off Grande Boulevard and Texas Highway 110 and another in the Cedar Creek Lake area, near Henderson and Kaufman counties. They will begin construction on the Tyler site later this month.

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