WVU Medicine officially absorbs Independence Health System, welcomes new employees
The "Country Roads" of the West Virginia University Health System have now extended into western Pennsylvania.
As of Oct. 1, WVU Medicine officially absorbed Independence Health System, including five hospitals and numerous facilities it operated, plus Independence Health's employees and patients.
At WVU Medicine's Westmoreland Hospital in Greensburg on Monday, staff members were officially welcomed into the Mountaineer family.
Employees at the facility were treated to a picnic lunch, free WVU merchandise, music from The Pride of West Virginia, WVU's marching band, and a chance to meet the Mountaineer mascot.
Albert Wright, president and CEO of WVU Health System, said the day was all about celebrating the new staff and facilities coming under the WVU umbrella, as well as all of their new patients.
"If you are a longtime patient of one of the Independence Health hospitals, whether it be in Westmoreland, Latrobe, Butler, wherever, you're still going to have the same great caregivers," Wright said. "What we're going to do is augment those caregivers with some good new infrastructure, like our electronic medical record, and we're going to also support and bring some more services to these communities. Really around our signature programs in heart and vascular, the neurosciences, cancer, pediatrics, critical care, and trauma. So it's going to still feel the same, but it will get better and better in time. We'll also make some significant physical plant improvements, and we're determining right now what those are going to be."
The medical merger was announced more than a year ago and is expected to bring more than $800 million in financial investment to the former Independence Health facilities, including its five hospitals across Westmoreland, Butler and Clarion counties.
Employees who spoke with KDKA-TV at the Westmoreland Hospital welcome party were all very positive about the new beginning.
"I love it," said Carl Kokoska, who has worked in housekeeping at Westmoreland Hospital for several decades. "It is going to be good for everybody, the community, all of us, employees, families and so on. It is going to be good."
