Meharry Welcomes Vanderbilt as New Managing Partner of Hospital

Black Issues in Higher Education, Feb 4, 1999

NASHVILLE Tenn. -- Vanderbilt University Medical Center wants to become a third player in the year-old partnership between Metro General Hospital and Meharry Medical College.

Under the plan announced last month, Vanderbilt would run the hospital and share with Meharry teaching, research, and patient care at the 126-bed publicly owned hospital.

"This alliance joins two distinguished academic health centers in a strategic, synergistic partnership that will surely set the standard for cooperative efforts by other institutions nationwide." Meharry's President John E. Maupin Jr., D.D.S., says, "This is important ... because I don't think there's a medical school in the country that can stand by itself unless it has a lot of resources."

"We have found that the strengths of our institutions are very complimentary, and we fully expect this alliance to grow and expand to provide a more secure quality future for Meharry and Vanderbilt," John E. Chapman, M.D., dean of the Vanderbilt School of Medicine, adds.

The plan is expected to be approved by the City Council and Vanderbilt is expected to take over May 1. Under the three-year agreement, Vanderbilt will appoint the top three hospital administrators and will pay $395,000 a year to cover their salaries. Two current administrators have been moved to positions at the city's long-term care facility.

A quasi-governmental hospital authority made up of current members of the hospital board will raise and distribute money for the facility, and hospital staffers will remain city employees.

Before joining up with the city in January 1998, Meharry could barely afford to maintain its teaching hospital -- a key part of its mission to educate and treat underserved minorities. While Meharry's hospital was woefully underused, Metro General's antiquated building was so crowded there sometimes were eight patients to a room. Now the city operates its hospital in a gleaming tower it leases on the school's campus for $4 million a year.

But the hospital still is struggling under the burden of health-care cutbacks. Nashville officials hope the addition of Vanderbilt to the alliance will allow General Hospital to keep providing care to those who can't afford it.