Intermountain Healthcare

Intermountain Health Care, Inc. (IHC) logo 1975-2005

Intermountain Healthcare was founded on April 1, 1975.[4] Prior to Intermountain, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints operated many of the hospitals in the region through its Health Services Corporation. The Church decided in 1974 it would no longer operate the hospitals and decided it would donate its fifteen hospitals as a system to the intermountain community.[4] The church did this on the condition that a not-for-profit organization would be formed to operate the hospitals on behalf of the communities they served.

Since its inception, board members of Intermountain Healthcare have been unpaid volunteers. Raising funds was done through the bond market and within just a few years, several additional hospitals asked to join the Intermountain organization. Intermountain's hospital market share (about 45 percent of Utah's hospital beds) has remained consistent since the organization was formed.

In 1982, Intermountain Healthcare began providing non-hospital services such as clinics and home healthcare. Four additional hospitals were added from 1982 to 1990. In 1991, Intermountain was recipient of The Healthcare Forum/Witt award.

In the mid-1990s, Intermountain Healthcare restructured into three major groups: hospitals, physicians, and health plans.

In 2002, Intermountain served as the Medical Services Provider for the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

In 2005, Intermountain implemented a new logo and slightly changed the spelling of its name from Intermountain Health Care to Intermountain Healthcare. The purpose was to reflect today's more common spelling of "healthcare." Up until this time, Intermountain was well known as "IHC," which was also discontinued with the name change.

In 2006, Intermountain renamed its health insurance plan "SelectHealth" and formalized the separate management of the insurance side of the organization.[5]

Intermountain has sometimes been subject to review by the Utah State Legislature because of the hospital organization's nonprofit mission and because they own 21 of Utah's 60 hospitals. However, proposals by competitors to force Intermountain to sell off either the insurance or hospital components of the organization have been fruitless.

In 2005 the Utah State Legislature hired an outside research company to review Utah's healthcare marketplace. While the independent experts did not address all of the challenges facing Utah's healthcare industry, the researchers did conclude that "considerable evidence exists to support the conclusion that Utah's health-care markets are performing competitively. . . Intervention by the Utah Legislature to promote competition in these markets is not necessary." The six-month study recommended that the Utah legislature refrain from creating more regulations for Utah's healthcare marketplace stating, "Competitive markets are more likely to be harmed than helped by regulatory directives."

In 2009, Intermountain Healthcare was identified as a healthcare model by President Barack Obama, "We have long known that some places, like the Intermountain Healthcare in Utah. . ., offer high-quality care at cost below average."[6] According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Utah's per capita spending on healthcare is 44 percent below the national average.[6]

Intermountain Healthcare announced that beginning in 2011 it would offer health insurance benefits for its employees' domestic partners.[7]

Intermountain Healthcare operates 22 hospitals in Utah and Idaho.^[7] Intermountain also operates 185 clinics, and urgent care facilities that are run by physicians as part of the Intermountain Medical Group.[4] In total, Intermountain Healthcare operates over 160 healthcare facilities, employs about 1,400 of Utah's 5,000 physicians and provides insurance to about 22 percent of Utah. It is also the largest private employer in Utah.[8]

In response to drug shortages and pricing scandals, Intermountain Healthcare and other hospitals formed a generic drug manufacturer, Civica Rx, in 2018 to produce generic drugs that are in short supply or highly priced.[9][10][11][12][13]

In April 2020 Intermountain signed a contract with Banjo, a Utah-based tech company, to provide opiate data, COVID-19 pandemic information, and other event data to the hospitals. The contract's existence was publicized after the CEO's past involvement with the KKK and a drive-by synagogue shooting was revealed.[14]

Intermountain Healthcare operates 23 hospitals in Utah and Idaho,[15] with 2,745 licensed beds, as listed in the table below:

Intermountain Healthcare Life Flight logo (since 2005)

Intermountain Life Flight, Intermountain Healthcare's air ambulance unit, provides emergency air transportation as well as non-emergency transport for victims particularly in remote areas, as well as emergency scenes where time is critical. In addition to transport, Life Flight also provides search-and-rescue services to the region. It consists of five helicopters and three fixed-wing aircraft.

Life Flight originally began service in 1972 with just fixed-winged aircraft, but on July 6, 1978, it performed its first patient transport by helicopter, becoming the seventh helicopter (rotor wing) air medical service in the United States.[16]

Intermountain currently operates one Agusta A109K2 helicopter and five Agusta AW109 SP Grand helicopters. The helicopters are based at McKay-Dee Hospital Center in Ogden, Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo, Intermountain Medical Center in Murray, Primary Children's Medical Center in Salt Lake City, Uinta Basin Medical Center in Roosevelt and Dixie Regional Medical Center in St. George. Life Flight also operates two Beechcraft B200 King Air twin-turboprop aircraft and one Cessna CJ 4 Jet. One King Air and the CJ4 are based at Life Flight's operations center at the Salt Lake City International Airport, and the third is based at St. George Regional Airport.[17] The helicopters generally service an area 150 mile around their base, but can travel 1,000 miles without refueling. In addition to servicing Utah, Life Flight transports patients from Arizona, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Wyoming, and other locations in the Western United States.[18]

Life Flight and its staff are Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS) certified. All of Life Flight's helicopters routinely use night vision goggles (NVG) and its Agusta Grands can operate in high-altitude situations. Life Flight can provide a medical control physician 24/7 so its staff does not have to rely solely on standing orders or protocols, as do many other similar air medical services. Life Flight has six teams:[19]

• Adult Team
• Pediatric Team - Life Flight is the only air ambulance service with paramedics and nurses specially trained to care for infants and children (ages 0–18) that operates in the Intermountain West.[20]
• Neonatal Team - Life Flight performs about 1,200 neonatal transports each year
• Respiratory Team
• LVAD Team - Assisting those patients in need of a ventricular assist device
• Hoist / Search & Rescue Team - Life Flight has performed hoist rescues since 2001; in fact, it is the first and only civilian air ambulance service in the United States that conducts hoist rescues[20] and the only such service in the intermountian region.

• List of hospitals in Utah
• Alta View Hospital hostage incident

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Intermountain Healthcare.

• Official website