Merger of Hazelden and Betty Ford Center Approved

California has approved the merger of the Hazelden Foundation and the Betty Ford Center, the Star Tribune reports. The new organization will be called the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation. It will be the nation’s largest nonprofit treatment organization.

In a statement, Mark Mishek, President and CEO of the merged organization, said, “We are now well-positioned to respond to the challenges and opportunities presented by health care reform and the rapidly changing marketplace. Together, we will be able to better utilize the addiction treatment field’s most extensive expertise, knowledge and data to accelerate innovation in treating the chronic disease of addiction and expand our already robust national system of care. Together, we will be better able to help all those who seek recovery find it.”

Analysts said the merger will allow the organizations to reduce administrative costs, and to bring treatment into more outpatient settings. Each organization has its own specialties, such as Betty Ford’s programs for treating chronic pain and addiction, and Hazelden’s programs for treating health care professionals and young people, the article notes.

The combined organization operates 15 sites in nine states. It will be headquartered in Center City, Minnesota, where Hazelden is based. It offers residential and outpatient services, a publishing house, an addiction research center and an accredited graduate school of addiction studies. The Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage, California will keep its name. It will add the tagline: “a part of the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation.”

The boards of both organizations announced last June that they were considering a formal alliance. At the time, officials at both organizations said one incentive for a possible alliance was the Affordable Care Act, which is expected to greatly increase the number of Americans who will receive health care coverage.