Logan Health CEO: Hospital system to rebrand in 2025

Billings Clinic-Logan Health is expected to change its name and brand following the merger of the two hospital systems last year.

“Right now, we have maintained the Billings Clinic-Logan Health names but starting the first quarter of next year we’re going to start about a year-long process [to change that],” said hospital Co-CEO Kevin Abel at a Kalispell Chamber of Commerce luncheon on Nov. 19. 

Abel provided an update at the luncheon on the status of the hospital and its integration with Billings Clinic into one health care system.  The hospital system rebranded as Logan Health in 2021 after changing its name from Kalispell Regional Healthcare. 

“We need to do some research, we need to gather some input,” Logan Health Marketing and Communications Vice President Mellody Sharpton said about the rebranding process. “We want to make sure we’re being thoughtful, but from a priority standpoint, our patients are our focus.” 

The newly unified hospital systems are also working to coordinate patient care and set up a single electronic medical records system. The hospitals partnered with Oracle Health in October to create an integrated platform for maintaining medical records. The system is expected to be in place next year. 

AT THE luncheon, Abel pointed toward the hospital’s growth over the past decade. 

Logan Health has added over 40 facilities, from the along the Hi-Line and south to Polson, and its demand for care has doubled in clinics, emergency rooms, surgeries and births.  

Some of that increase, specifically the rise in births, is attributed to Whitefish’s North Valley Hospital merging with Kalispell Regional Healthcare in 2021, before the hospitals came under the Logan Health name. 

There are about 4,500 staff members at Logan Health compared with a decade ago when the staffing level was about 2,700. The number of medical staff has nearly doubled.  

“Combined with Billings Clinic, Logan Health-Billings Clinic are by far the largest health care entity in the state now,” Abel said. 

Billings Clinic has locations across eastern Montana as well as six clinics in Wyoming and maintains a staff of more than 4,000 people.  

Ahead of the 2025 state legislative session, Abel touched on the importance of Medicaid, noting that without Medicaid expansion funding, Logan Health stands to lose approximately $68 million.

In Montana, there were about 220,000 people covered under Medicaid and of those about 78,000 were covered under expanded Medicaid as of August, according to the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services. Nearly two-thirds of those enrolled in Medicaid reside in rural areas, according to state data.  

At Logan Health in 2022 and 2023, 17% of patients treated were covered by Medicaid, which represents $120 million of Logan Health’s net revenue.  

"If not renewed, it will have a significant financial impact to Logan Health,” Abel said.  

Reporter Kate Heston may be reached at 758-4459 or kheston@dailyinterlake.com.