Johnson City Medical Center, a flagship hospital for Ballad Health, has received a rating of one star out of five from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.(Brett Kelman/KFF Health News)
Ballad Health, an Appalachian company with the nation’s largest state-sanctioned hospital monopoly, may soon be required to improve its quality of care or face the possibility of being broken up.
Government documents obtained by KFF Health News reveal that Tennessee officials, in closed-door negotiations, are attempting to hold the monopoly more accountable after years of complaints and protests from patients and their families.
Ballad, a 20-hospital system in northeastern Tennessee and southwestern Virginia, was created six years ago through monopoly agreements negotiated with both states. Since then, Ballad has consistently fallen short of the quality-of-care goals, according to annual reports released by the Tennessee Department of Health.
Despite these failures, Tennessee has given “A” grades and annual stamps of approval to Ballad that allow the monopoly to continue. This has occurred, at least in part, because Ballad is graded against a scoring rubric that largely ignores how its hospitals actually perform.