Securing the Future of Healthcare in The Dalles and the Columbia River Gorge Together with Adventist Health

In December, Mid-Columbia Medical Center (MCMC) and Adventist Health approved an affiliation agreement for MCMC to join Adventist Health (pending regulatory and state review).  As part of the agreement, Adventist Health has committed $100 million to MCMC to strengthen rural healthcare in the region.

Together, MCMC and Adventist Health intend to maintain and enhance the immediate and long-term financial viability of MCMC that enables us to make needed investments in the healthcare campus, technology, programs and people.

We are thrilled that our affiliation will create a more vibrant and comprehensive healthcare hub for our community—and allow MCMC to benefit from Adventist Health’s enhancements in clinical and organizational initiatives, purchasing support, access to additional clinical and operational expertise, greater economies of scale and much more.


Next steps

We now await final regulatory and state approvals before MCMC will officially become part of Adventist Health’s Oregon Network, which includes other medical centers in Portland and Tillamook and more than 47 other clinics. In the meantime, our two organizations will continue to meet and discuss how, together, we can best deliver equitable, cost-effective, high-quality care now and for years to come.

What this affiliation means for our community and patients

This affiliation positions MCMC to continue meeting the needs of our diverse, growing community and providing high-quality, local healthcare for generations to come. More specifically, for our community and patients, the affiliation will:

  • Promote reliability, availability and continuity of healthcare in order to meet the needs of the community
  • Strengthen MCMC’s ability to deliver healthcare programs that support the well-being of the community
  • Increase health equity and equitable access to care for all residents of The Dalles and the Columbia River Gorge, furthering our charitable mission
  • Broaden and deepen MCMC’s engagement with and support of the community
  • Provide a broader depth of healthcare services that people of our community need and can access close to where they live and work

What this affiliation means for our employees, physicians and APPs
Our pending affiliation with Adventist Health will allow us to continue maintaining, recruiting and advancing a dedicated and high-performing workforce. Specifically, for our employees, physicians and APPs, the affiliation will:

  • Provide access to sophisticated recruitment capabilities to retain high-quality primary care and specialty care physicians and APPs
  • Provide additional resources and opportunities that can position MCMC as an employer of choice for employees and clinical partner of choice for the medical staff community
  • Build upon the great work of our teams to continue increasing the clinical quality of our services and programs
  • Promote and retain our team-based culture, consistent with the Planetree Philosophy that celebrates our past, while building our future

Why Adventist Health

Adventist Health is the right cultural and operational fit for MCMC, our team members and the community. They are dedicated to the long-term viability of their affiliated health systems, from investing in their employees and physicians to expanding the services they provide. Additionally, like MCMC, Adventist Health has a culture of care and kindness as well as the expectation of high-quality healthcare.

The affiliation between MCMC and Adventist Health will provide additional resources to enhance the quality of healthcare and invest in our people and resources in ways not possible otherwise. Together, we look forward to the continuation of local patient-centric care as well as new growth opportunities for the communities we serve.

Our Path to Today
Over the last few years, the healthcare industry has continually changed, with rural community hospitals like ours facing the strongest headwinds. After careful deliberation, the MCMC Board of Trustees determined that our ability to thrive in the future may rely on an affiliation with a strong organization and ultimately decided that Adventist Health was the right fit for healthcare in our local area.

Following the launch of the exploration process in December of 2021, we spent months asking our community and team for input as we considered different partner opportunities. Over the course of many months, the MCMC Board of Trustees considered proposals through multiple lenses, including the ability to keep care local, their potential investments in rural and community care and their plans to maintain and enhance employee, physician and APP satisfaction, opportunities and education.

In August of 2022, the Board of Trustees voted unanimously to move forward with a letter of intent between MCMC and Adventist Health. Since then, the teams from MCMC and Adventist Health have worked thoughtfully and thoroughly to fully determine the details of an agreement, which was approved by both MCMC’s Board of Trustees and Adventist Health’s Board of Directors in December of 2022. We now await final regulatory and state approvals before MCMC will officially become part of Adventist Health’s Oregon Network.

To learn more about why we decided to explore an affiliation, click here.

To learn more about our partnership exploration including FAQs, click here.

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