The action item that helped HonorHealth 'quickly' integrate 3 Steward hospitals

Scottsdale, Ariz.-based HonorHealth saw significant growth at the end of 2024 with the Oct. 3 acquisition of three Dallas-based Steward Health Care hospitals in Arizona, bringing the health system's portfolio to nine hospitals.

Steward sought Chapter 11 protection May 6 and has since offloaded or closed the majority of its 31 hospitals. 

Now, HonorHealth is working to integrate the hospitals, bringing all three under the Epic EHR that the system uses.

"[Epic is] going to … allow us to provide ongoing care across online locations," Lisa Montman, executive vice president and CFO of HonorHealth, said during a Becker's CFO+Revenue Cycle podcast. "It's been a very quick integration in terms of bringing Epic live, but that was one of the key things that we identified early as [what was] going to enable our success."

Ms. Montman said the integration allowed for a unified revenue cycle and fostered collaboration between providers and employees.

To ensure a smooth transition, Ms. Montman said leadership from HonorHealth's "legacy" hospitals met with teams at each of the three former-Steward hospitals to further understand their operations, people and culture.

"It's also [about] standardizing as best we can, as quickly as we can," she said. "Getting all of the supplies and ordering on our own terms and contracts … it's really about making sure that you have a very good understanding of your system, and then how are you going to take your existing system and create synergies with the newly acquired locations. I think we've done that very well."

Looking to future growth, Ms. Montman said HonorHealth is keeping a close eye on population and projected trends in the Arizona market. The system has developed a long-term growth plan that takes it to 2030. Ms. Montman's team worked closely with the strategy team to pull data around population growth and the needs across the overall Phoenix metro area. From there, they evaluated the data and created a long-term plan.

Ms. Montman said the initial long-term plan did not include the three Steward hospitals, but they were added in and are continuing to inform the system's long-term growth strategy.

"It's really a partnership amongst the executive team members here at HonorHealth, working with the strategy team, working with the finance team, working with operations to understand the needs and how HonorHealth can best serve the community."

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