CRMC Looking To Purchase Surgery Center

The Cookeville Regional Finance Committee approved the purchase of the Upper Cumberland Physicians Surgery Center at its Tuesday meeting.

An outside firm assessed the building and the operation at $3.835 million. Cookeville Regional will pay $1.9 million or 50 percent of the fair market evaluation. Cookeville Regional already owns 50 percent of the practice.

“It fits very well into one of our strategic initiatives in our strategic plan, and that is to continue to grow surgery market share in our area,” CEO Paul Korth said. “It protects our market right now. We do about three thousand GI cases over there on an annual basis and about fifteen hundred surgical cases on an annual basis. And if we didn’t have that center, it would be very, very difficult for us at the medical center to bring that many more cases over to our current operating rooms.”

The opportunity to purchase the practice came earlier this fall. Though not budgeted, Korth said the medical center would be careful of its capital spending through the rest of the fiscal year.

Cookeville Regional helped establish the center in 2004 with a $1.3 million investment. That granted CRMC a 50 percent ownership stake. A group of physicians owned 40 percent while a management company owns 10 percent. Cookeville Regional already owns the land.

Korth said the center would continue to be operated as a separate entity with the same procedures and processes as it currently operates.

The CRMC Board Of Directors will consider the purchase Thursday night.