Sansum Clinic Joins Sutter Health

Transaction Announcement

Sansum Clinic, the oldest and largest nonprofit, outpatient healthcare provider on the California Central Coast, has joined Sutter Health, headquartered in Sacramento. 

Sansum initiated a process to assess its strategic options, ultimately deciding to seek a partnership. After a comprehensive search, Sansum selected Sutter as its partner of choice, signing a Letter of Intent in Q2 of 2023. 

Through this transaction, Sansum was able to find a like-minded, patient-focused, physician-centric organization that shares a not-for-profit mission to provide care in the communities they serve. Kurt Ransohoff, MD, CEO of Sansum Clinic, said “it felt like fate or destiny to be in discussions with an organization that thinks about the world in a way that complemented the way we saw it” during a recent press conference. As part of the transaction, Sutter will make significant investments in the clinic, with a key focus on:

•    Improvement of the group’s ambulatory surgery services.

•    Advancement of primary and specialty care access and offerings. 

ECG’s Role

Sansum Clinic and its affiliated medical group, Sansum Santa Barbara Medical Clinic, engaged ECG Management Consultants as its adviser to evaluate strategic options and facilitate a transaction. ECG assisted Sansum by:

•    Conducting a strategic options analysis.

•    Assessing the local market.

•    Drafting informational documents.

•    Soliciting interest from a variety of potential partners with a shared vision for providing care along the Central Coast. 

Upon Sansum’s selection of Sutter as its preferred strategic partner, ECG helped establish a strategic partnership and execute a successful transaction. Sansum Clinic officially joined Sutter Health on October 2, 2023. The transaction firmly secures the future of this storied, 100-plus-year-old group. 

Sansum Clinic

Sansum Clinic is a not-for-profit, 23-site outpatient healthcare provider primarily serving the Santa Barbara community. The clinic treats more than 120,000 unique patients per year. With 250-plus providers and 40 specialties, including oncology, endocrinology, neurology, and orthopedics, Sansum provides a vast spectrum of services to its patients and community. Its vision, to provide high-value healthcare to the communities it serves while also creating and sustaining a model of care that will thrive in California’s rapidly changing healthcare arena, has endured for over 100 years, making it one of the strongest healthcare providers in California.

Sutter Health

Founded in 1921, Sutter Health is a not-for-profit, 23-hospital system serving more than 3 million Californians. Sutter Health’s integrated network has created a connected model of care that delivers coordinated healthcare when, where, and how people need it. The system is composed of hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, cardiac centers, cancer centers, acute rehabilitation centers, and more, making up a total of 4,000-plus licensed general acute care beds served by more than 12,000 physicians and over 53,000 employees. 

For more information, please contact ECG directly.

_{Edited by: Matt Maslin}

Published October 5, 2023