BEAVER, Pa. — With the stroke of a pen, leaders from both health organizations, Heritage Valley Health System and Allegheny Health Network, officially signed their intent to merge.
“This is a historic day for all of us,” said Dan Onorato, Executive Vice President and Chief Corporate Affairs Officer with Highmark Health. “Most importantly [it’s historic] for the hundreds of thousands of residents who call the greater Beaver County and western Allegheny County regions home.”
The merger of the two systems adds the hospitals in Beaver and Sewickley to AHN, bringing their total to 16 in the region. AHN will also absorb multiple urgent care clinics, doctors and specialist offices, with more than 3,300 employees and 600 physicians.
It’s something Heritage Valley has wanted to do for more than a decade.
“We started down this path of looking for a partner in 2013,” said Heritage Valley Health System President and CEO Norm Mitry. “[We] tried a couple of things that didn’t work. Then COVID hit.”
Mitry said Heritage Valley Health System already sees thousands of patients insured by Highmark. Highmark is owned by AHN. He said the affiliation between AHN and Heritage Valley makes sure those patients, and others, continue to get in-network care they need, without needing to drive to Pittsburgh or other locations.
“To be able to provide high-quality care consistent with continuity is incredibly important for the county,” Mitry told Channel 11’s Andrew Havranek.
Mitry said without a merger, the future of Heritage Valley Health System was uncertain. They closed their Ohio Valley Hospital in Kennedy this summer. While he believes there would have still been a hospital in Beaver and Sewickley, some procedures may have been discontinued.
“A lot of those specialty services require specialty physicians that are high-cost physicians,” Mitry said. “So, what it would mean is we would become more of a stopover point to treat and stabilize and transfer to the city instead of being able to provide the high-quality care here at Sewickley and Beaver.”
The merger of the two health networks isn’t complete. The deal has to be approved by the Pennsylvania Attorney General and the Federal Trade Commission. That process could take five months to a year.
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