DaVita HealthCare Partners, Denver, is expanding its multispecialty medical group operations into a fifth state with the acquisition of Arizona Integrated Physicians.
HealthCare Partners—a DaVita subsidiary since last November—already operates physician networks in California, Nevada, Florida and New Mexico. Its latest buy adds 700 physicians and allows it to join forces with one of the largest independent medical organizations in Arizona.
DaVita's 2012 acquisition of HealthCare Partners launched an ambitious plan to transform the company into an integrated delivery network from one specializing in providing dialysis to patients with end-stage renal disease.
Arizona Integrated Partners, an independent practice association headquartered in the Phoenix suburb of Peoria, also gives DaVita HealthCare Partners its fourth Medicare accountable care organization. AIP participates in a Medicare Pioneer ACO through the Banner Health Network, a partnership that also includes Banner Medical Group, the Banner Physician Hospital Organization and Banner Health.
HealthCare Partners operated three of the 32 Pioneer ACOs that embarked on the experiment Jan. 1, 2012, but recently shifted those ACOs to Medicare's less-risky Shared Savings Program after failing to earn savings in the first year.
Banner Health Network, meanwhile, earned more than $13 million in savings for its care of 50,500 patients, and the group previously said in a statement that it is focused on sustaining those results in the years to come.
Like HealthCare Partners, AIP provides healthcare services under a capitated model for Medicare managed-care plans and commercial insurers. It was founded in 1994 as Sun Health Partners before being renamed in 2007.
HealthCare Partners entered the New Mexico market in September 2012, with the purchase of ABQ Health Partners, a multispecialty medical group in Albuquerque.
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