Cooperative Health Services Inc history

In 1920, Doctor James Tate Mason joined with colleagues Drs.

Bob Mitchell worked as education director for the giant Pacific Supply Co-op, founded in Walla Walla in 1933 to provide farmers with low-cost fuel and fertilizer.

No doubt inspired by Group Health Association, organized by federal workers in the "other Washington" in 1937, the group adopted the name, Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound.

Also in 1938, Leslie G. Pendergast took control of a contract medicine service in downtown Seattle's Securities Building and renamed it the Medical Security Clinic.

Taylor encountered Shadid's book, A Doctor for the People, in 1939 and passed it on to others, including Ella Williams, a leader in King County's influential Pomona Grange.

Williams won passage of a resolution to the State Grange in 1940 urging study of medical cooperatives to cut costs and expand health care.

On December 22, 1945, the founding Board filed incorporation papers with the State of Washington.

Group Health Cooperative began providing health care after merging in 1946 with the Seattle-based Medical Security Clinic, a physician-owned group practice whose idealistic doctors also believed in preventive care.

It began operating, so to speak, on January 1, 1947, when it took over a Medical Security Clinic (MSC) and St Luke's Hospital.

Led by attorney Jack Cluck, Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound incorporated as a nonprofit organization in 1945. It paid $200,000 for MSC and assumed a mortgage of $50,000 on St Luke’s Hospital, which was renamed Group Health Hospital in 1948.

The Cooperative had added a wing with 30 beds to the old St Luke's Hospital in 1950, and the following year opened its Central Clinic nearby in the former Costa Vista apartments.

Sandy MacColl stepped in as Northrop's replacement in late 1952 and slowly pacified the two sides with the aid of a new chief of staff, Doctor Alfred Magar.

In the summer of 1953, Group Health created an independent co-op to provide dental services.

In August 1955, Executive Director Doctor John A. Kahl began his 10-year shift.

MacColl was then tapped to head the Cooperative's first completely new facility, the Northgate Clinic, when it opened in 1958.

Dues were raised in 1960 (to $8.00 a month for men and $8.50 for women) in an attempt to cap a projected $500,000 deficit.

In 1961, representatives of Kaiser Permanente, a prepaid medical services firm based in Portland, Oregon, intimated they would pursue group contracts within Washington State if Group Health did not.

Due to illness, Doctor Kahl retired as executive director in the spring of 1965.

Psychiatrist Doctor Jack R. Brown was hired to set up the program, and it began serving patients in 1966.

Hospital costs and doctors' fees grew too during the decade's inflationary periods&mdashout 20 percent in 1974 alone.

X-ray technicians walked off the job for ten days in 1975, and nurses staged a 28-day strike the following year.

In 1976, Group Health chose a new leader, Don Brennan, formerly vice-president for finance and administration.

In late 1978, GHC took over a Tacoma medical center operated by the nation's first federally recognized HMO, Sound Health Association.

Brennan resigned in 1980; Gail Warden, who had formerly led Chicago's Rush-Presbyterian-St Luke's Medical System, became CEO the next year.

All the efforts to provide the community with a member-sponsored health plan began to show tangible results in 1981 when enrollment surged to 11,353 members.

In 1983, Group Health officials created a credibility crisis when they suppressed an article on noxious arsenic emissions from the American Smelting and Refining Company, with whom Group Health had a contract, set to run in the cooperative's View magazine.

Enrollment growth failed to meet projections in 1985.

Administrative offices were moved to the old Seattle Post-Intelligencer headquarters in 1987.

Warden stepped down as CEO, to be succeeded by Aubrey Davis in February 1988.

In 1990, Group Health incorporated a for-profit affiliate, Options Health Care.

Phil Nudelman, executive vice-president for operations, replaced Aubrey Davis as president and CEO in January 1991.

Group Health launched 'The Partnership Program' in February 1993.

Annual revenues exceeded $1 billion for the first time in 1994.

Kokmen, Leyla, “Old Health Groups Eye Benefits of New Alliances,” Seattle Times, September 14, 1996.

Fryer, Alex, “Nudelman Smarts Over Focus on His Degrees,” Seattle Times, June 1, 1997.

——, “Two More Insurers Won’t Sell Health Policies,” Seattle Times, December 25, 1998.

Beason, Tyrone, “Group Health Pulls Out of Most Rural Areas,” Seattle Times, May 27, 1999.

Gilje, Shelby, “For this Health Insurance, a Mere 272 Questions,” Seattle Times, November 1, 2000.