Helix Health

As Helix Health was in negotiations with Johns Hopkins that could merge the state's two largest hospital systems, its president and chief executive officer, James A. Oakey, abruptly resigned, Helix announced yesterday.Oakey is leaving for personal reasons, the Helix announcement said. He will be replaced by Michael R. Merson, a former Helix CEO.Patricia K. Smyth, who chairs the Helix board, said it was "not true at all" that Oakey's departure was related to the talks with Hopkins. She refused further comment on the change in Helix's leadership, saying, "I want to guard Jim Oakey's privacy and that of the board."

John P. McDaniel, who led MedStar Health and its predecessors for a quarter-century, building it into a large comprehensive health system, will retire as chief executive officer at the end of next year, MedStar announced yesterday. Kenneth A. Samet, president and chief operating officer, will assume the CEO title Jan. 1, 2008. Samet first went to work for McDaniel as part of Samet's graduate training in hospital administration in 1982, and he has worked for McDaniel ever since. MedStar, with headquarters in Columbia, was formed by the 1998 merger of Medlantic Healthcare Group - including its flagship Washington Hospital Center, the largest hospital in the District of Columbia - and Helix Health, which operated five hospitals in the Baltimore area.

Helix Health and Medlantic Healthcare Group announced yesterday that they will merge to form the largest health system in the region.Helix has five hospitals and handles 18 percent of the patients in the Baltimore region, while Medlantic operates Washington Hospital Center, the largest hospital in the District of Columbia.Together, the new system will have 2,300 acute-care beds, 850 beds in such areas as long-term care and rehabilitation, about 100,000 inpatient admissions a year, $1.4 billion in annual revenue and 2,100 employees.

MedStar Health -- already the largest health system in the region with five hospitals in the Baltimore area and two in Washington -- and Georgetown University announced yesterday that they have decided to have MedStar operate Georgetown's financially troubled hospital.MedStar and Georgetown said they signed a "letter of commitment" yesterday but that a final agreement was several months away.The deal would represent the next step in the evolution of MedStar, which was formed a little more than a year ago by the merger of Helix Health, based in the Baltimore area, and Medlantic Healthcare Group, operator of Washington Hospital Center, the largest hospital in the District of Columbia.

Helix Health has recruited a soft-spoken southeastern Louisiana doctor and handed him the formidable job of organizing hundreds of physicians into a force that can help its four hospitals cope with the fierce competition that is overtaking the medical business.Dr. Michael C. Tooke, medical director of the Ochsner Clinic, a group practice with 425 physicians at 16 sites in southeastern Louisiana, will bring to the job "experience in working with just the kind of situation Helix is trying to create in Baltimore," said James A. Oakey, president and chief operating officer of Helix Health, who announced the appointment yesterday.

A health clinic opened at Carter Godwin Woodson Elementary School yesterday in the belief that healthier students will have better success in school.Two corporations -- NationsBank and Helix Health -- have underwritten the school health center, through donations of staff time and money.The clinic targets students whose families have no health insurance and no pediatrician."We consider ourselves a safety net," said Gerry Waterfield, a city Health Department official who overseas the school health centers.

Helix Health, which manages four hospitals and a range of other medical services in the Baltimore region, agreed yesterday to form a partnership with a Washington-based group that effectively creates one of the largest health care systems in the country.The deal between Helix Health and the Medlantic Healthcare Group is considered to be further evidence of changes afoot in how medical care in the United States is managed so that insurance rates and the money patients pay out of their own pockets can be better controlled.

The boards of Helix Health and Harbor Health System are scheduled to meet today, potentially approving an agreement that would bring Harbor into the Helix system, sources said.The deal would add 376 beds to the 1,300 in the Helix network -- making it slightly larger than the 1,600-bed Johns Hopkins Health System. Helix already includes Good Samaritan, Union Memorial, Franklin Square and Church Home, which began merged operations in August.James A. Oakey, president and CEO of Helix, had previously confirmed interest in Harbor.

Japan voices hope for trade accordJapan expressed hope yesterday that a trade agreement would be reached with Washington before a U.S.-imposed deadline at the end of the month. An agreement is designed to open Japanese markets to American products in order to narrow the two countries' $60 billion trade gap. Washington has threatened Tokyo with sanctions unless an agreement is reached on government procurement by Sept. 30.IBM holds off on PowerPCIBM's personal computer division decided yesterday to delay selling machines based on the advanced PowerPC chip until next year because there is no software for them.

The new position of Andrea A. Braid was reported incorrectly in The Sun on April 29. Braid is executive director/chief executive officer of Keswick.The Sun regrets the error.HealthKeswick center appoints Braid executive directorThe Keswick, a multicare center, announced the appointment of Andrea A. Braid as executive director and chief financial officer of the North Baltimore nursing, assisted living and adult day care facility. Before joining the Keswick, she was with Medlantic at Layhill, in Silver Spring and is a former vice president at Good Samaritan Hospital.

Helix Health and Medlantic Healthcare Group announced yesterday that they will merge to form the largest health system in the region.Helix has five hospitals and handles 18 percent of the patients in the Baltimore region, while Medlantic operates Washington Hospital Center, the largest hospital in the District of Columbia.Together, the new system will have 2,300 acute-care beds, 850 beds in such areas as long-term care and rehabilitation, about 100,000 inpatient admissions a year, $1.4 billion in annual revenue and 2,100 employees.

Helix Health, with five hospitals in the Baltimore area, and Medlantic Healthcare Group, which operates the largest hospital in the District of Columbia, are in serious discussions that could lead to a merger agreement soon, sources say.A merger would join two strong players in what has already become a regional Baltimore-Washington health market. The two not-for-profit institutions have been working together for several years through a joint venture called BWHealth, based in Columbia, which does contracting and purchasing.

A health clinic opened at Carter Godwin Woodson Elementary School yesterday in the belief that healthier students will have better success in school.Two corporations -- NationsBank and Helix Health -- have underwritten the school health center, through donations of staff time and money.The clinic targets students whose families have no health insurance and no pediatrician."We consider ourselves a safety net," said Gerry Waterfield, a city Health Department official who overseas the school health centers.

As Helix Health was in negotiations with Johns Hopkins that could merge the state's two largest hospital systems, its president and chief executive officer, James A. Oakey, abruptly resigned, Helix announced yesterday.Oakey is leaving for personal reasons, the Helix announcement said. He will be replaced by Michael R. Merson, a former Helix CEO.Patricia K. Smyth, who chairs the Helix board, said it was "not true at all" that Oakey's departure was related to the talks with Hopkins. She refused further comment on the change in Helix's leadership, saying, "I want to guard Jim Oakey's privacy and that of the board."

THERE ARE signs announcing the event and there is talk throughout the neighborhood about the Linthicum Health Fest from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at Lindale-Brooklyn Park Middle School on Andover Road. But what exactly is it?According to Cathy Ulrich, one of the organizers of the free event, it is a gathering of people interested in spirituality, personal growth, healing and community well-being.Harbor Hospital Center and Helix Health Park will provide blood pressure screenings and a teddy bear clinic for children.

Urologist Louis A. Shpritz's main office is in Glen Burnie, but for the past two decades he's done most of his surgery at Harbor Hospital in Baltimore."

John P. McDaniel, who led MedStar Health and its predecessors for a quarter-century, building it into a large comprehensive health system, will retire as chief executive officer at the end of next year, MedStar announced yesterday. Kenneth A. Samet, president and chief operating officer, will assume the CEO title Jan. 1, 2008. Samet first went to work for McDaniel as part of Samet's graduate training in hospital administration in 1982, and he has worked for McDaniel ever since. MedStar, with headquarters in Columbia, was formed by the 1998 merger of Medlantic Healthcare Group - including its flagship Washington Hospital Center, the largest hospital in the District of Columbia - and Helix Health, which operated five hospitals in the Baltimore area.

Helix Health yesterday announced a three-year project to re-examine how it operates. Called Building Helix Health, the project could result in savings of $65 million to $80 million and a staff reduction of about 1,000 from the current 12,000, according to Steven S. Cohen, vice president for operational development at Helix.Any staff reductions, Cohen said, would "depend on the market" and could probably be accomplished through attrition, since normal turnover is about 1,000 employees a year.

Helix Health yesterday announced a three-year project to re-examine how it operates. Called Building Helix Health, the project could result in savings of $65 million to $80 million and a staff reduction of about 1,000 from the current 12,000, according to Steven S. Cohen, vice president for operational development at Helix.Any staff reductions, Cohen said, would "depend on the market" and could probably be accomplished through attrition, since normal turnover is about 1,000 employees a year.

The new position of Andrea A. Braid was reported incorrectly in The Sun on April 29. Braid is executive director/chief executive officer of Keswick.The Sun regrets the error.HealthKeswick center appoints Braid executive directorThe Keswick, a multicare center, announced the appointment of Andrea A. Braid as executive director and chief financial officer of the North Baltimore nursing, assisted living and adult day care facility. Before joining the Keswick, she was with Medlantic at Layhill, in Silver Spring and is a former vice president at Good Samaritan Hospital.