The Drew Memorial Health System’s Board of Directors held a special called meeting at 1 p.m. on Monday, June 12. The meeting took place via Zoom with Mike Akin,Carl Lucky, Wayne Owen, Jay Jones, Josh McKiever, Scott Barrilleaux, Jessie Griffin, Tim Ezell, Stephanie Norris, and representatives of the local press present.
The meeting was called to discuss the resolutions relating to the upcoming merger with Baptist Health, mainly the management agreement and sub-lease agreement.
Tim Ezell of Friday, Eldredge, and Clark Law Firm stated the general idea of the management agreement. Baptist Health is committed to being in the community, but they are not ready to take over the hospital because DMHS is still in the process of implementing Baptist’s electronic medical records (EMR) system, and there are medicaid and medicare provider enrollment issues which still need to be resolved. The idea is that effective July1, a management agreement between DMHS and Baptist would be established. Baptist would effectively manage the hospital until December 3, when the full merger is expected to take place.
Under the management agreement, DMHS would still be the operator of the hospital, meaning they would still do their own billing and all patients would be patients of DMH. Due to the large financial expenditure to update the EMR and other minor changes to the facilities, Baptist would take an active role in management, including some day to day operations.
Entering into this management agreement would also show a commitment to enter into the sub-lease agreement in December. The sub-lease will effectively give control of the hospital and it’s operations to Baptist Health. The sub-lease is set for a period of 25 years.
The DMHS Board discussed the need to approve entering the management agreement and sub-lease prior to that night’s Quorum Court meeting. All present agreed that this was a good idea, and would cut down on any delays that might be presented at the Quorum Court meeting. The board approved DMHS to proceed.
Ezell stated that he would be present at the Quorum Court meeting to present this information. These items and the Quorum Court’s decision will be further discussed at the Board’s regularly scheduled meeting.
