SYLVANIA - While the purchase of a small-town hospital by a group of doctors is not a common practice in Georgia or even the U.S., Screven County Hospital CEO George St. George said it was precisely that unusual opportunity that steered the county's Hospital authority to decide to sell.
      Screven County Hospital was an independent hospital prior to being managed by Memorial Health out of Savannah for more than 10 years. That relationship ended in 2005, at which point the Hospital Authority became solely responsible for the hospital's management. It was in the past three years that looking for a change was explored seriously, St. George said, to determine the best option for continuing operation of the hospital and meeting the needs of the community.
      St. George said there is a great deal of uncertainty as to whether or not the recently passed health insurance reform, once enacted, would achieve what is predicted.
      "There are some leading futurists in health care that would say that the ability for small independent rural hospitals like ours to make it through the reform period is pretty slim," he said.
      After exploring numerous avenues, the hospital authority was approached by a group of Savannah orthopedic doctors as part of Southeastern Orthopedic Center who expressed an interest in purchasing the hospital.
      "The proposal coincided with one of the options we had considered," St. George said.
      At the same time, he said, no other organization, hospital or company in Georgia had expressed any interest in working closely with the authority, operating or owning the hospital.
      Their presence as a group of physicians already working in Southeast Georgia was a strong element in the consideration of the group's proposal, he said.
      "It's a combination of factors that make the sale a reasonable approach to securing a strong viable future for the hospital," St. George said.
      Part of the transaction is to absorb the hospital's long-term debt in the form of a bank mortgage, he said.
      Also, as a recipient unit of county SPLOST for capital projects, the transfer of ownership would allow that amount to be used for other purposes within Screven County government. Ad valorem and sales taxes, previously a nonissue for the public entity, would be returned to the county through the private owners, he said.
      The pending agreement fixes the amount of county provision for indigent care to an amount lower than it has been and fixes it to a number of years, after which time the support will go away, so the county would not have that additional need to collect ad valorem taxes to support indigent care in the community, he said.
      The plan also calls for all current employees at the time of closing to continue with their same compensation and a comparable benefits package.
      With some Screven Hospital facilities dating back to 1951 and decades of facing economic challenges, St. George said the authority board believes the Savannah doctors will have more access to capital through which to make improvements to the physical plant and reinvest in technological advancements.
      "The hospital was designed in the 1940s," he said, "for the way health care was delivered at that time."
      The space is not configured for modern-day equipment, lab space, or ventilation required for health care delivery today, he said.
      Southeastern Orthopedic Center purchased the Tattnall County hospital almost two years ago and are in the process of purchasing the Jenkins County hospital as well.
      What makes this situation less than typical, St. George said, is that the Savannah group intends to operate all three hospitals as general medical/surgical facilities, as opposed to specialty hospitals.
      The group has kept an orthopedic concentration in Tattnall with growth and success over the past two years, he said, and will most likely build on the strengths of the other hospitals to develop similar growth, bringing more physicians and employee opportunities to the hospital over the next year if the transaction is completed.
      Screven Co. Hospital is strong in general surgery and eye surgery, he said, so they will probably consider building on those areas.
      The transaction is expected to be completed before the end of the year if approved by the state attorney general's office, which is required on a sale of a public asset to a private party as a statute of the hospital authority.
      St. George will continue to represent the hospital through the closing of the transaction and once they've identified a successor, he said will retire after 13 years with the Screven Hospital.