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Sound Physicians Enters Agreement to Provide Hospitalist Services at Covenant Health Systems Hospitals in Maine

Sound Physicians will provide 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week inpatient medical coverage in partnership with community providers at the following hospitals:

• St. Mary's Regional Medical Center, a 233-bed acute care hospital serving the needs of the Androscoggin County, Maine region
• St. Joseph Hospital, a 112-bed acute care facility serving Bangor, Maine and surrounding communities

"St. Mary's Regional Medical Center and St. Joseph Hospital have long-standing traditions of providing excellent service to patients in the state of Maine," said Robert Bessler M.D., chief executive officer of Sound Physicians. "We're excited to be part of that tradition and bring our model of care to additional hospitals in New England."

Ira Shapiro, M.D., chief medical officer of St. Mary's Regional Medical Center, stated, "We chose Sound Physicians because of their proven record of clinical excellence, their well-developed clinical processes and their advanced information systems. We believe this partnership will assure the delivery of superb care to our hospitalized patients."

Ron Skarka, vice president of business development at St. Joseph Hospital, said, "We were looking to enhance our Hospitalist service. We currently have an exemplary group of physicians as part of the St. Joseph Hospitalist service. We will now be able to build upon this service by utilizing Sound Physicians' proven infrastructure and day-to-day management experience, necessary parts of a strong hospitalist practice."

Under the agreement, hospitalists previously employed by St. Mary's Regional Medical Center while being managed by another organization will join Sound Physicians. St. Joseph Hospital's hospitalists, who were employees of the hospital, will also join Sound Physicians. Sound Physicians will take over leadership and management of both programs to drive performance.

Working closely with the leadership teams and hospitalists at the campuses of the two Maine hospitals, Sound Physicians will introduce its proprietary SoundConnect workflow and informatics platform to drive improvements to inpatient care outcomes and financial performance. Sound Physicians will also bring its considerable expertise in building a high-performing hospital practice to the two hospitals, including strong physician leadership, revenue cycle management and a track record of physician recruiting success.

With the two Covenant Health Systems hospitals, Sound Physicians continues to expand its presence through hospital partnerships in the Northeast.

About Sound Physicians

Sound Physicians is a leading hospitalist organization focused on driving improvements in quality, satisfaction and efficiency of inpatient health care delivery. By investing deeply in outstanding physicians, clinical process excellence and its proprietary workflow and informatics technology, Sound Physicians improves the delivery of inpatient care. Sound Physicians aligns with healthcare providers to measurably enhance patient outcomes and strengthen its partners' financial performance. The organization is the practice of choice of more than 500 hospitalist and post-acute physicians. To learn more visit: www.soundphysicians.com

Media:
Sound Physicians
Senior Communications Manager
Daven Rosener, 800-850-9665
drosener@soundphysicians.com
or
New Partnerships:
Sound Physicians
Senior Vice President of Business Development
Amin Neghabat, 253-682-6018
aneghabat@soundphysicians.com