Healthcare industry

Moody’s Investors Service raised its rating to Baa1 from Baa2 on Wheaton Franciscan Services in recognition of several years of improved operations at the Wisconsin hospital and the strong results expected this year.

CHICAGO — Bids to buy the assets of an upscale continuing-care retirement community in downtown Chicago are due by April 10, with holders of its $229 million of debt hoping for a competitive auction that results in a better recovery rate than the pennies on the dollar offered by an initial bidder.

Moody’s Investors Service on Monday downgraded to B3 from Ba3 the long-term rating assigned to Weirton Medical Center in West Virginia.

Holders of $229 million of debt issued for a now-bankrupt upscale continuing care retirement community in downtown Chicago would recoup just pennies on the dollar under an initial bid for the facility.

Moody’s Investors Service affirmed the Baa1 rating assigned to Boston Medical Center’s bonds, and revised the outlook to stable from negative.

Moody's Investors Service affirmed the A1 rating on Jackson Laboratory's fixed-rate series 2007 revenue bonds, issued through the Association of Bay Area Governments Finance Authority for Nonprofit Corporations, with a stable outlook.

Moody’s Investors Service Wednesday revised the outlook on Renown Health to stable from negative, and affirmed its A3 revenue bond rating on $556 million of debt.

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board approved Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s new $300 million, 1-million square-foot outpatient facility. The hospital hopes to complete the project by 2014. The building at the hospital’s main downtown Chicago campus will also house doctors’ offices.

Standard & Poor's changed St. Peter's Hospital’s outlook to positive from stable, citing immediate benefits from the Albany hospital's recent merger.

CHICAGO — Illinois has agreed to the Illinois Medical District Commission's request that a $4.5 million capital grant be diverted to cure a debt-service coverage default and ensure bondholders receive full payment later this year on $40 million of state moral obligation-backed bonds.

BRADENTON, Fla. — The 198-bed Citrus Memorial Hospital, near the west coast of Florida, sank further into non-investment-grade territory Wednesday when Moody's Investors Service downgraded its debt to Ba3 from Ba2.

A U.S. District Court judge in Chicago has dismissed the final count lodged against former Bear Stearns public finance banker P. Nicholas Hurtgen by federal prosecutors in connection with an extortion scheme involving a Chicago-area hospital seeking regulatory approval for a new hospital.

CHICAGO — The "national explosion of consolidation" across the health care sector differs in key ways from past trends, as providers face new, complex problems and new players have entered the game to craft merger models that include risks and benefits, Moody's Investors Service said in a report released Thursday.

LOS ANGELES — Downey Regional Medical Center emerged from bankruptcy protection Wednesday, marking only the third time in California history a hospital has done so without changing ownership, hospital officials said.

Still recovering from Gov. Pat Quinn's recent call for $2.7 billion in Medicaid cuts, not-for-profit hospitals in Illinois took a second blow when he lifted a six-month moratorium on stripping hospitals of their property tax-exemptions for failing to provide sufficient charity care.

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board last week approved Naperville-based Edward Hospital’s $64 million expansion plan.

LOS ANGELES — Officials at Downey Regional Medical Center are probably wondering if five will be their lucky number after the bankrupt Southern California hospital announced the fifth postponement of a planned bond buyback Monday in a disclosure filing.

Moody’s Investors Service last week downgraded Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare’s rating one notch to Baa2 due to the Illinois hospital operator’s modest operating performance for fiscal 2011 and the first half of fiscal 2012.

CHICAGO — The Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic plans to enter the market this spring to borrow roughly $200 million of new money for projects as part of the clinic's plans to spend $700 million annually on capital improvements over the next five years.

Standard & Poor’s revised its outlook to stable from negative and affirmed its BBB-plus ratings on the Massachusetts Development Finance Agency’s Series 2008 and 1998 bonds issued for the Boston Medical Center.