# Ballad Health

Ballad Health is a chain of hospitals headquartered in Johnson City, Tennessee. It includes facilities in Tennessee and Virginia. Some of its locations are also urgent care centers and primary care locations. They operate a blood bank, named Marsh Regional Blood Center.
The healthcare system's website states that its service area includes 29 counties, some of which are in Kentucky and North Carolina.
The current Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Ballad Health is Alan Levine. Levine's compensation for 2023 was $3,557,360 plus $247,091 in other payments. Under Levine's leadership, Ballad's strategy has included closing many healthcare centers in rural areas, which has led to a healthcare monopoly across the region. Levine also previously co-chaired the healthcare transition for Governor Rick Scott, whose company was fined a record $1.7 Billion for Medicare and Medicaid fraud.

## History

Ballad Health was created in 2018 when Mountain States Health Alliance and Wellmont Health Systems agreed to merge together through the issuance of a certificate of public advantage (COPA) in Tennessee and a similar document known as a cooperative agreement in Virginia.
Ballad Health is a new health system, created specifically to address the most critical healthcare needs of communities in Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia. This new kind of healthcare organization is made possible through state oversight and was created with the support of local business community, physicians, educators and countless other people who have a stake in improving the health of the Southern Appalachia region.
Lee County Community Hospital, which had closed in 2013, was reopened by Ballad Health in July 2021.
Dennis Barry, who consulted for the Southwest Virginia Health Authority as a monitor, stated that the Ballad merger meant that healthcare access in portions of Virginia did not collapse during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2022, they started a virtual urgent care option.
In August, 2023, they posted their first net operating loss for the fiscal year 2023 with a loss of 40 million dollars.

## Service area

The system's official service area includes the following counties in the Appalachian region:
* Tennessee: Carter, Cocke, Greene, Hamblen, Hancock, Hawkins, Johnson, Sullivan, Unicoi, and Washington
* Virginia: Buchanan, Dickenson, Grayson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Smyth, Tazewell, Washington, Wise, and Wythe
* North Carolina: Ashe, Avery, Madison, Mitchell, Watauga, and Yancey
* Kentucky: Harlan and Letcher

## Hospitals
### Tennessee

* Bristol Regional Medical Center (Bristol)
* Franklin Woods Community Hospital (Johnson City)
* Greeneville Community Hospital (Greeneville)
* Hancock County Hospital (Sneedville)
* Hawkins County Memorial Hospital (Rogersville)
* Holston Valley Medical Center (Kingsport)
* Indian Path Community Hospital (Kingsport)
* Johnson City Medical Center (Johnson City)
* Johnson County Community Hospital (Mountain City)
* Niswonger Children’s Hospital (Johnson City)
* Sycamore Shoals Hospital (Elizabethton)
* Unicoi County Hospital (Erwin)
* Woodridge Hospital (Johnson City)

### Virginia

* Dickenson Community Hospital (Clintwood)
* Johnston Memorial Hospital (Abingdon)
* Lee County Community Hospital (Pennington Gap)
* Lonesome Pine Hospital (Big Stone Gap)
* Norton Community Hospital (Norton)
* Russell County Hospital (Lebanon)
* Smyth County Community Hospital (Marion)