HCA Healthcare, the second-largest hospital company in the United States, was founded in Nashville 50 years ago.
Experts have described the company as the core of the city health care industry, which spun off smaller companies as it grew and attracted partners and rivals to Nashville. Many of the hundreds of health care companies in Nashville today are children or grandchildren of HCA.
“Nashville would be a much different city today without HCA being here,” CEO Milton Johnson said in a recent interview with The Tennessean. “Over the past 50 years the growth of that ecosystem and Nashville’s growth has gone hand in hand.”
Over the past five decades, HCA has grown to include 178 facilities and nearly 250,000 employees. About 5 percent of all hospital care occurs in an HCA facility, according to the company.
But HCA wasn’t always so big.
HCA: 50 years ago, a chicken-fried idea launched Nashville’s most important company
1978
Dr. Thomas Frist Sr., Dr. Thomas Frist Jr. and businessman Jack Massey incorporate the Park View Hospital company, naming Massey as the first CEO. The company changes its name to Hospital Corporation of America, or HCA, three months later.
1979
By the end of its second year, HCA already owns 23 hospitals. Many of these hospitals were bought or built in rural areas where nonprofit hospitals had failed to thrive.
1973
Five years after HCA was founded, the company owns 57 hospitals in 13 states.
1981
HCA makes its biggest deal yet, buying Hospital Affiliates International, another Nashville-based hospital chain that was one of its biggest rivals. HCA now operates 349 hospitals with nearly 50,000 hospital beds.
Hospital Corporation of America Chairman Thomas F. Frist Jr., who this year reasserted closer personal control of daily operations, is ending a turbulent 1987, but said he is confident that HCA and its spinoffs are healthier and have a better future than the combined operation during an interview at his office Dec. 15, 1987. (Photo: Ricky Rogers / The Tennessean)
1987
HCA spins off HealthTrust as part of a plan to downsize to a core group of about 130 medical-surgical hospitals and psychiatric hospitals. Frist Jr., the youngest founder of HCA, becomes chairman, president and CEO.
1998
Frist Sr., a respected Nashville doctor and HCA founder, dies at his home in the city.
1990
Massey, a legendary businessmen and the third founder of HCA, dies in Florida.
State and local officials applaud as Rick Scott announces that he is moving the Columbia/HCA headquarters from Louisville, Kentucky, to Nashville during a Jan. 10, 1995, news conference. (Photo: Ricky Rogers / The Tennessean)
1994
HCA merges with Columbia, forming the single largest for-profit health care company in the country. Columbia CEO Rick Scott becomes CEO of the merged companies.
1995
Columbia/HCA reabsorbs HealthTrust, swelling to a size not seen since the early '80s. By the end of the year, the merged network includes 340 hospitals and 135 surgery centers.
Philip W. Thomas, left, special agent in charge of the Memphis division of the FBI, speaks at a news conference on the HCA fraud investigation Dec. 15, 2000. With Thomas are Francis J. Crocco Jr., resident agent in charge of the Department of Defense; William A. Benson, special agent in charge of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation; and Patrick Petty, special agent of the Department of Health and Human Services. (Photo: Ricky Rogers / The Tennessean)
1997
HCA is subject to a massive federal investigation into health care fraud, leading to billions in fines and penalties. Scott resigns as CEO, and Frist Jr. returns to rebuild the company’s reputation.
Dr. Thomas F. Frist Jr., right, chairman and CEO, and Jack O. Bovender, president and COO, pose near the company's new logo after the Columbia/HCA 2000 annual meeting of stockholders May 25. (Photo: Ricky Rogers / The Tennessean)
2001
Frist Jr. retires, leaving the company without one of its founders in its leadership for the first time.
2007
An HCA pregnancy study reveals unknown risks in inducing labor for non-medical reasons before the 39th week of pregnancy. The study leads to changes in medical practice throughout the country.
Sunny Owunah, an HCA patient, receives an anti-septic sponge bath to prevent a MRSA infection at TriStar Centennial in 2013. HCA pioneered a procedure to prevent the spread of MRSA using data collected throughout its hospital network. (Photo: John Partipilo/The Tennessean)
2010
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study conducted at HCA hospitals discovers a new strategy for preventing the spread of hospital-acquired infections, including MRSA. As with the pregnancy study, these findings become an industry standard.
Mayor Karl Dean, right; Courtney Ross, chief economic development officer, center; and Milton Johnson of HCA listen during the Economic Diversity & Partnership 2020 gathering at The Bridge Building on Feb. 19, 2015. (Photo: Jae S. Lee / The Tennessean)
2013
Milton Johnson, the current CEO of HCA, assumes his post. Johnson has now worked for HCA for 34 years, entirely in Nashville.
Aug. 14, 2018
Johnson and other HCA executives ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Nashville’s most important company.
Source: "The Legend of HCA," a corporate history provided by the company