Is the parent company of Hilton Head, Coastal Carolina hospitals looking to sell?

Amidst a decline in patients, a leadership shake up and an increasing amount of debt, Tenet Healthcare is exploring a possible sale of the company, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Sources close to Tenet Healthcare, the parent company of Hilton Head Hospital and Coastal Carolina Hospital, told the Journal that the company is “exploring options,” which includes arranging meetings with possible buyers.

But due to the company’s large amount of debt, the number of buyers interested in purchasing the whole company is small, sources told the Journal.

When asked for comment Monday, a spokesman from Tenet Healthcare responded by email, “We decline to comment on speculation in the market.”

In October 2016, the healthcare company and two of its Atlanta-area subsidiaries paid more than $513 million to resolve criminal charges and civil claims relating to a scheme to pay kickbacks in exchange for patient referrals.

The scheme included operations at Hilton Head Hospital, which paid kickbacks to Clinica, a healthcare facility where staff directed expectant mothers living in the U.S. illegally to Hilton Head Hospital as way to increase revenue from Medicaid.

Then, in August, the company announced Chief Executive Trevor Fetter would “step down from his roles as director and chief executive officer at the earlier of March 15, 2018 or when a successor is appointed."

The announcement followed the resignation of two officials from Glenview Capital Management LLC — the activist investor and Tenet’s largest institutional shareholder — which has pushed the company for a sale or new leadership, according to the Journal.

Tenet operates more than 500 hospitals and outpatient centers across the country and is one of the largest for-profit hospital chains in the United States.

The company, like many U.S. healthcare facilities, has suffered from uncertainty over the fate of Medicaid programs and insurance exchanges under the Affordable Care Act.

The company’s same-facility admissions were down 2.2 percent last year compared to a .3 percent average decline across all publicly traded healthcare companies, according to data from RBC Capital Markets.

This story was originally published September 18, 2017 at 3:05 PM with the headline "Is the parent company of Hilton Head, Coastal Carolina hospitals looking to sell?."