Park Ridge Health to become AdventHealth Hendersonville in 2019

ASHEVILLE — Park Ridge Health will change its name to AdventHealth Hendersonville in early 2019, a move the hospital group said Tuesday marks a shift in the strategy of its parent organization.

The decision comes as its parent company, Adventist Health System, has begun rebranding as AdventHealth. Adventist, one of the country's largest faith-based health care systems, said the move is about being "one consumer-centric, connected and identifiable national system of care" for patients.

As a result, all of its nearly 50 hospitals as well as hundreds of its care facilities will adopt the AdventHealth name and logo in the near future. It is expected to complete its rebranding process by Jan. 2, 2019, the Altamonte Springs, Florida-based company said.

Terry Shaw, president and CEO of Adventist Health System, said in a news release the company is "transforming to be a more consumer-focused health care system" to best meet the needs of patients and communities.

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"Becoming AdventHealth allows us to be a fully integrated and distinguishable health system across all aspects of the care continuum," Shaw said, "while also speaking to our Christian healing ministry, message of wholeness and our rich Seventh-day Adventist roots."

Adventist Health System employs more than 80,000 workers nationwide. Park Ridge Health, which is based in Henderson County, joined Adventist in 1986. Before that, it had operated as an independent community hospital in the Fletcher area since 1910.

It serves patients in Hendersonville, Mills River, Fletcher, Arden and Asheville.

Park Ridge President and CEO Jimm Bunch said the rebrand is not expected to impact patients, programs or employees of the hospital. He said the change has been researched for the past two years with the understanding that patients prefer to get their care from a system.

Right now, he said consumers might not understand Park Ridge is part of the Adventist system — and that's likely to change as AdventHealth Hendersonville.

"Adventist Health System is (one of) the largest not-for-profit health systems in the country," said Bunch, the hospital's chief executive since 2006. "Nobody knows that and that’s our fault."

Bunch added that one of the hospital's tenets is making health care as easy as possible for patients, which he hopes they'll soon find under the new name and logo.

The decision comes at a time of some uncertainty for the future of health care in Western North Carolina.

Asheville's Mission Health is exploring the possibility of being acquired by the Nashville-based for-profit hospital chain HCA Healthcare Inc. It would mark a major changing of the guard for the not-for-profit system, joining HCA which operates 178 hospitals and 1,800 sites of care in 20 states and the United Kingdom. 

The deal also will spawn Dogwood Health Trust, a successor foundation expected to address social determinants of health in the region. 

Mission officials have said they hope to have a final sale agreement with HCA in mid-August.