It’s been about 1 1/2 months since UC San Diego and Escondido, Calif.-based Palomar Health created a new health system — Palomar UC San Diego Health — through a joint powers authority. As the work begins, UC San Diego Health CFO Carlos Bohorquez said both organizations have remained committed to preserving access to care.
“We provide some level of expertise to their management team, where possible, to further enhance the clinical services to provide stability from the financial standpoint,” Mr. Bohorquez said during an episode of Becker’s “CFO+Revenue Cycle Podcast.” “The intent here is to ensure that certain key programs are expanding in that community, and again, patients do not have to travel out of the community to seek higher level services. It’s going very well and a lot of hard work is ahead of us.”
Mr. Bohorquez said UC San Diego Health made a capital commitment in 2025 of about $160 million to the JPA, which was finalized in early July this year.
Under the agreement, the organizations will remain separate, retaining their own leadership team, employees and board. Rather than investing in a traditional merger or acquisition, the two parties created a new public entity that combines Palomar Health’s community hospitals with UC San Diego Health’s academic expertise.
Mr. Bohorquez, who has been with UC San Diego Health for about eight months, said navigating the JPA has been one of the biggest learning experiences in his career.
“It’s a fine balance as far as providing support to them and working with them, but also ensuring that there’s a very clear line between both organizations,” he said. “We are incredibly careful to ensure that we respect the separation of both enterprises, but provide support, guidance where possible, and any additional thought leadership.”
Mr. Bohorquez said looking ahead to the JPA’s first full year, the priority is identifying which programs need the most investment.
“The most important item would be to identify the most important programs that need to be expanded [and] solidified, ensuring that resources, both from a dollar standpoint but also from a human standpoint, get the most amount of attention over the next year. Then we start moving the needle across the board,” he said. “Whether it’s quality, whether it’s expansion of services, [or] financial stability of the enterprise, that would be the goal over the next 12 months.”
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