Macon’s Navicent Health terminates agreement with Milledgeville hospital

Macon-based Navicent Health has terminated its management agreement with Oconee Regional Health Systems in Milledgeville.

“With the recent change in leadership along with having heard and clearly understood the direction of both the Baldwin County Commission and community physicians, we have decided it is best to terminate the management agreement between Oconee Regional Health Systems Inc. and Navicent Health,” Rhonda Perry, chief operating officer of Navicent Health enterprise operations and finance, said in a statement emailed to The Telegraph.

As recent as June this year, Oconee had credited its “continuing turnaround” to its support services agreement.

Since that agreement was signed last fall, Navicent has guaranteed the payments on Oconee Regional’s $24 million bank debt, helped Oconee develop new programs to improve revenue and local access to health care services and helped reduce annual expenses by nearly $4 million, according to a June press release.

On May 20, Oconee’s CEO Jean Aycock told the board she planned to resign effective June 1, but Oconee Regional relieved her of her job May 29. The hospital agreed to pay her close to $400,000 in salary and benefits in exchange for Aycock agreeing not to make any legal claims against the hospital.

The hospital appointed its long-standing CFO, Brenda Qualls as acting CEO. However, by mid-July Qualls was replaced by Randall “Randy” Hoover as interim CEO.

Information from Telegraph archives was used in this report.

This story was originally published September 24, 2015 at 9:31 PM with the headline "Macon’s Navicent Health terminates agreement with Milledgeville hospital ."