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WVU Medicine taking big step into Western Pa.

By Rick Shrum for The 6 min read
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Holly Tonini

Construction is underway at the new WVU Medicine Outpatient Center in Franklin Township, Greene County.

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Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter

Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter

As CEO and president, Albert Wright has overseen expansion of WVU Medicine.

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Holly Tonini

Albert Wright, CEO and president since 2014, discusses WVU Medicine’s expansion during an interview at Ruby Memorial Hospital.

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Courtesy of WVU Medicine

A rendering of the tower to be built for WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital

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Courtesy of WVU Medicine

A map of WVU Medicine properties and affiliations in the tri-state area

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Courtesy of WVU Medicine

A drone shot of the J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital campus

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – A meticulously crafted map, displaying the footprint of West Virginia University Health System, rested at the fingertips of Albert Wright. And it is a formidable footprint, extending throughout the Mountain State and just beyond the border, into Garrett County, Maryland.

WVU Medicine, as the system is branded, has nine hospitals and three clinics, all but one of them in West Virginia.

Someday, that footprint may grow from size 10 to 16 EEE. WVU Medicine is in the midst of a multimillion-dollar expansion that eventually will include a presence in Southwestern Pennsylvania. It is constructing a clinic in Greene County and working on a partnership with Uniontown Hospital.

The system also has ramped up its physician staffing, hiring 364 in the past three years – 111 of them replacements for departing doctors, and 253 are new hires.

There is a perception north of the Mason-Dixon that WVU Medicine is heading full bore into this region, raising the competitive level by taking on UPMC, Allegheny Health Network and Washington Health System. And while WVU’s northward move should ramp up the stakes, Wright, WVU Medicine’s president and chief executive officer, asserts it is a strategic expansion – and certainly not full bore.

He said the strategy is to tend to health-care needs of West Virginia residents, and to those residing just across state lines – many of whom travel to the Mountain State for treatment.

The intent, Wright said, is to make more physicians and services available to more patients, while providing convenience.

“We primarily take care of a rural population from West Virginia,” Wright said last week in the offices of J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown, the hub of WVU Medicine operations.

“We made an active decision to go into border counties (in Pennsylvania). Being in Greene County, Washington County and Fayette County makes a ton of sense. We’ve always gotten patients from those counties.

“But you’re not going to see us open sites in Phoenix, Jacksonville or China. There are great hospitals in Pittsburgh. There is not a burning need to be in Pittsburgh.”

But there is, indeed, a market in Southwestern Pennsylvania for WVU Medicine – and it is growing. The health system reported that in 2017, its outpatient clinics saw a total of 65,988 patients from Greene, Washington and Fayette. Last year, that figure rose to 85,131, an increase of 19,143 or 29 percent.

Ruby Memorial also is a convenient destination for patients from the southwest corner. Commuting there is easier than it would be to a facility in the Pittsburgh area. Morgantown is a mere 25 miles from Uniontown, 20 from Waynesburg, 45 from Washington – all via an interstate.

Patients from those counties may be making even shorter excursions in upcoming months. WVU Medicine is building a clinic in Franklin Township, adjacent to Walmart and just outside Waynesburg. Primary care services and clinics in family medicine will be among services offered. Wright anticipates a September opening.

That facility is not far from where a competitor, WHS-Greene, is operating.

“Doctors will see patients in Greene County instead of here,” Wright said. “Patients won’t have to leave home. The medical records will be available in the system.”

Then last month, officials at Uniontown Hospital announced they were seeking a partnership with WVU Medicine. If that occurs, the hospital would remain independent, but switch clinical affiliation from UPMC.

Uniontown Hospital Chief Executive Officer Steve Handy said at that time that recruiting physicians through UPMC was a challenge because of a shortage of doctors and because of the distance they would have to travel between Uniontown and Pittsburgh.

“They (Uniontown Hospital) came to us on this. This partnership makes a lot of sense,” said Wright, who was previously a vice president at UPMC Presbyterian in Pittsburgh. He joined WVU Medicine in 2014, and in less than five years, has helped grow the system’s portfolio from four hospitals to nine.

He believes the deal with Uniontown will be finalized by July 1. But that could be only a couple of toes of WVU Medicine’s footprint in Fayette. Wright said the system has acquired land in Uniontown and “may build a facility there.”

An outsider may view construction of a clinic in Greene County as a brazen challenge to Washington Health System, but Wright doesn’t – and neither does Gary Weinstein, president and CEO of the independent organization.

“I don’t think this will hurt Washington Health System in any way, shape or form,” Wright said. “There’s plenty of room for both of us.”

Weinstein said: “Generally, our national public policy about health care is that competition is beneficial, helps to improve service and helps to keep costs under control. Providers are free to compete in markets as they see fit. WVU does that, other health systems do it … we do it. It’s a free market and there they’re going to do what they believe is best for their health system.

He added that “I believe that we are providing excellent health care in the Greene market and believe we’re well positioned to provide services to the people of Greene County despite competition.”

WVU Medicine, from all appearances, is a healthy health-care system, one that employs 18,000-plus and is expanding its physician rolls and facilities. In addition to locations in West Virginia and Maryland – and the pending presence in Pennsylvania – the system has four clinics in Virginia and one in Ohio.

Ruby Memorial “is bigger than any hospital in Pittsburgh,” Wright says proudly. This is a modern facility as well, one that continues to evolve.

Heart transplants will take place at the WVU Heart & Vascular Institute, which opened in January 2017. Breakthroughs in Alzheimer’s study are being pursued at the WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute. Construction is underway on the $152 million WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital tower, which is targeted to open by late 2020. Pediatric treatment is currently conducted on the sixth floor of Ruby.

WVU Medicine is well positioned in the present. Wright wants it to remain so.

“Long term, we want to have a robust continuum of care. We’re a growing health-care system trying to do good things.”

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