by Tina Reed | Nov 12, 2019
An $11 billion megamerger planned between South Dakota-based Sanford Health and Iowa-based UnityPoint has been called off, officials confirmed Tuesday.
In June, the two health systems announced the planned merger deal that would have created one of the 15 largest nonprofit health systems in the country. With plans to become leaders in “personalized primary care,” they said they intended to complete the deal by the end of the year.
Executive management teams and physicians from both health systems worked to provide a merger recommendation to both boards over the last 18 months.
“We were excited at the opportunity our combination would have provided to create a new health system of national prominence,” said Kelby Krabbenhoft, president and CEO of Sanford Health, in a statement. “We are disappointed that the UnityPoint Health board failed to embrace the vision. Our focus now is on the patients and communities we serve and the 50,000 people working tirelessly to support them.”
