Emergency Care Partners Merges with Ascension Emergency Physicians
April 24, 2019
Transaction Represents Emergency Care Partner’s Second Add-on Acquisition Since Partnering with Varsity Healthcare Partners in September 2018
PENSACOLA, Fla — April 24, 2019 — Emergency Care Partners (“ECP”), a leading regional provider of emergency medicine and outsourced emergency department management services to hospital facilities across Louisiana, New York, and Pennsylvania, today announced a strategic merger with Ascension Emergency Physicians (“AEP”). AEP is a Gonzales, Louisiana-based provider of outsourced emergency department management services to Our Lady of the Lake Ascension (f/k/a St. Elizabeth Hospital).
The combined emergency medicine platform will service departmental operations at 20 hospitals, supported by a combined clinical workforce of 201 physicians and 223 mid-level providers, treating in excess of 710,000 ER patient visits annually. AEP’s founding physicians, Dr. Chris Trevino and Dr. Jamie Broussard, will join as ECP shareholders and continue to serve in a leadership capacity at AEP.
Dr. Trevino commented, “We see this merger as a new and exciting opportunity to provide the highest quality of care to our community and to our health system. We look forward to partnering with the ECP team.”
In terms of strategy, the combined business will continue its service-intensive approach to managing small- and medium-sized emergency departments, leveraging ECP’s unique business model that combines local physician equity partnerships and its differentiated technology platform to ensure local service accountability and care quality at each ECP facility served. Further, ECP’s physicians, including legacy physician partners, will continue to serve as meaningful shareholders in the combined company.
ECP is backed by Varsity Healthcare Partners (“VHP”), a lower middle-market healthcare services private equity investment firm with expertise in growing care provider platforms, along with Regal Healthcare Capital Partners, a New York-based healthcare services growth equity and buyout firm.
Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP acted as legal adviser to ECP and VHP, while Offering Solutions PLLC acted as legal advisor to AEP.
About Emergency Care Partners
Based in Pensacola, Florida, Emergency Care Partners is a leading regional provider of emergency medicine and emergency department management services to hospitals and other free-standing care facilities. The company was initially formed through the joint recapitalization of Professional Emergency Medicine Management (“PEMM”) and Professional Emergency Physicians Associates (“PEPA”), both Louisiana-based, clinically differentiated emergency medicine providers, and owned at inception by Varsity Healthcare Partners, in partnership with PEMM’s/PEPA’s founders and partner physicians. Subsequently, ECP expanded its geographic footprint by partnering with Progressive Emergency Physicians (“PEP”), a leading Long Island, New York based provider of outsourced emergency department management services to facilities across New York and Pennsylvania.
About Varsity Healthcare Partners
Varsity Healthcare Partners is a lower middle-market private equity investment firm focused on partnering with founders, entrepreneurs and management teams to build leading healthcare services companies. VHP has been successful in developing and executing a tailored value-creation plan, in partnership with the leadership of each company that typically emphasizes investments in infrastructure followed by an aggressive organic and acquisition growth strategy. VHP draws upon its extensive healthcare industry experience and relationships, as well as its hands-on partnership approach to effectively drive growth and maximize value. For more information please visit: www.varsityhealthcarepartners.com.
About Regal Healthcare Capital Partners
Regal Healthcare Capital Partners is a lower middle-market focused growth equity and buyout firm which seeks to partner with leading edge healthcare entrepreneurs who are in need of financial investment and strategic, operational and managerial expertise. Regal’s Co-Founders, Dr. David Kim and Jon Santemma, bring a unique combination of operational and transactional experience to healthcare services companies seeking to realize their growth potential. For more information, please visit: www.regalhcp.com.
Contacts
For More Information:
Mickey Mandelbaum or Nick Rust
Prosek Partners
(212) 279-3115
mmandelbaum@prosek.com / nrust@prosek.com