Sanford, Parent of Non-Profit Skilled Nursing Giant Good Sam, to Merge with Intermountain

The parent company of a non-profit skilled nursing and senior care heavyweight is about to get even larger.

Sanford Health this week announced its intention to merge with fellow non-profit system Intermountain Health, bringing 366 senior care centers operated by The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society along with it.

The two parties signed a letter of intent, with the goal of consummating the merger sometime next year pending government approval.

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Sanford and Intermountain will continue to operate under their names in the wake of the merger, with Sanford CEO Kelby Krabbenhoft continuing as president emeritus; Intermountain CEO Marc Harrison will serve as the chief executive of the combined group.

Good Sam will also retain its name moving forward, with no other major changes expected, according to a Sanford spokesperson. Intermountain’s office in Salt Lake City will house the new headquarters, though Sanford will maintain its corporate offices in Sioux Falls, S.D.

“This merger enables our organizations to move more quickly to further implement value-based strategies and realize economies of scale,” Harrison said in a joint statement. “Through coordinated care, increased use of telehealth and digital health services, we will make health care more affordable for our communities.”

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The resulting company will operate 70 hospitals and 435 clinics with a staff of more than 89,000, according to Sanford; the footprint of 366 Good Sam skilled nursing and senior living properties spans across 24 states.

“Today we’re marking another major milestone in our long history of working to change the course of health care across the globe,” Krabbenhoft said in the statement. “By coming together with Intermountain Healthcare, we will improve the health and well-being of the communities we serve and strengthen our impact in health care delivery and value.”

The move comes less than two years after Sanford’s merger with the previously independent Good Sam, which the two parties finalized in January 2019.

At the time, Good Sam’s leadership positioned the move as a way to more fully capture the continuum of acute and post-acute care.

“Historically, there’s clinics and hospitals and long-term care facilities,” Good Sam president Randy Bury told SNN at the time. “Those were very siloed, and quite honestly, depending what silo you were in, you didn’t care what was going on with the patient when they weren’t in your silo. It just didn’t matter much. You’d hand them to the LTC facility and only worry about them if they came back onto your doorstep someday. That’s all changing now.”

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