PROVIDENCE — After years of delays, the nonprofit Centurion Foundation is expected to finalize the purchase of two struggling hospitals in Rhode Island from their bankrupt corporate owner on Friday.
Centurion has tried for four years to acquire Roger Williams Medical Center in Providence and Our Lady of Fatima Hospital in North Providence, two cash-strapped hospitals that have been run by Prospect Medical Holdings, a for-profit hospital chain.
“This is really a good day,” said Rhode Island Attorney General Peter F. Neronha during a press conference on Friday afternoon at Roger Williams Medical Center. “The fact that these hospitals will remain open is obviously a really good thing.”
The deal was financed with more than $100 million in bonds.
This deal “was probably one of the hardest things we’ve ever done,” said Ben Mingle, the president of The Centurion Foundation.
Mingle said patients should be able to see investment in the hospital equipment and parts of the hospital.
“You’re going to see some relief on the staff about the uncertainty of their future, and that’s going to help them be able to provide better care to the patients,” said Mingle during the press conference.
The two hospitals have been at risk of closing for months. In late October, Prospect threatened in court to shut the hospitals down, a move that health leaders warned would be catastrophic for patients in Rhode Island.
Roger Williams and Fatima see more than 50,000 emergency room visits per year, and perform routine and emergency surgeries daily. Roger Williams has a Level IV Alcohol & Drug Detoxification Program, and is home to the state’s only bone marrow transplant program. Fatima is the state’s second-largest behavioral health services facility, and operates about 25 percent of the state’s behavioral health beds.
Now the hospitals will remain open, but they will be owned by a Georgia-based nonprofit organization that has no endowment and has never run hospitals before. The Centurion Foundation has struggled to raise the funds required to purchase the two Rhode Island hospitals.
The two safety-net hospitals care for thousands of vulnerable Rhode Islanders, many of whom are covered by public insurance. The hospitals have long been mismanaged, with Prospect and its private-equity backers extracting millions in dividends.
“I’m thrilled beyond belief that we’ve got the corporate greed, for-profit healthcare out of our hospitals,” said Lynn Blais, a nurse and president of United Nurses and Allied Professionals, the union that represents many workers at the hospitals.
The staff at these hospitals, “have waited a long time for this day to come,” she said.
Since 2022, Prospect has shuttered hospitals, cut services, and faced lawsuits in Pennsylvania and Connecticut, and has been accused of “corporate looting” and endangering patients. The for-profit company currently owes $3 billion to creditors.
Prospect was previously owned by private equity firm Leonard Green & Partners until 2021. Leonard Green took $658 million in dividends and fees from Prospect.
In a scathing 2024 critique, 11 state attorneys general called Prospect Medical “possibly the worst example of private equity greed: enriching investors at the expense of low-income, vulnerable patients.” Regulators in several states, including in Rhode Island, have been putting pressure on Prospect over its troubled finances and deteriorating conditions at its facilities. Prospect filed for bankruptcy in January 2025.
While Centurion struggled to raise the money, Neronha and other state leaders looked for alternative buyers, none of which were ideal.
In late 2025, Prime Healthcare — the fifth-largest for-profit health care system in the country — suddenly showed interest in buying Fatima hospital and Roger Williams Health Center.
Like Steward Health Care, which wreaked havoc in Massachusetts, Prime has a history of buying struggling hospitals and running them lean. Faced with allegations of Medicare fraud, overbilling, false claims, and kickbacks, Prime has reached multiple settlements with the Justice Department. It already owns Landmark Medical Center in Woonsocket, which it purchased from bankruptcy in 2014.
But as Prospect threatened to close Fatima hospital and Roger Williams Health Center, some leaders in Rhode Island were reluctant to have Prime take over the two cash-strapped hospitals.
“Have we reached the state of any port in the storm? Yeah, we have,” Neronha said in an interview in November. “We don’t get to choose the buyer. We can either say ‘yes’ or we can say ‘no’” as a regulator. But when the stakes are closure or ‘yes,’ it makes our job much more difficult,” Neronha said.
Over the years, Neronha had also tried to persuade hospital executives across the region to take on Fatima hospital, Roger Williams Health Center, or both. None were interested.
The deal with Centurion finally reached the finish line thanks in part to Rhode Island’s political leaders, who in early February appropriated $18 million in a reserve fund. Centurion president Ben Mingle said the measure would “satisfy key requirements of investors, which was to see meaningful support from the State of Rhode Island for these hospitals.”
“Honestly, there were many times that we didn’t think this deal was going to happen,” Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi told reporters on Friday. “It was very, very precarious to be honest with all of you.”
“At moments like this, it’s worth celebrating,” Governor Dan McKee said of getting the deal finalized. “Today is a day to celebrate.”
Christopher Gavin of the Globe Staff contributed to this report.
This story has been updated with additional information from a press conference.
Alexa Gagosz can be reached at alexa.gagosz@globe.com. Follow her @alexagagosz and on Instagram @AlexaGagosz.