Risant Health to add third health system to its portfolio: Oklahoma’s Integris Health

Kaiser Permanente’s Risant Health has zeroed in on Oklahoma City-based Integris Health as its next acquisition target. The organizations announced Wednesday that they have signed a definitive agreement.

Integris Health is the largest not-for-profit health system in Oklahoma, with 10 acute hospitals, 10 specialty hospitals, physician clinics, urgent care centers, and the state’s largest physician network.

Greg Adams, CEO of Kaiser Permanente, said in the announcement:

“We’re excited to have Integris Health become part of Risant Health and join us in changing healthcare in this country. Together, Risant Health and its organizations are moving health care from siloed, episodic care to a value-based care approach with an increased focus on evidence-based care that achieves healthier outcomes for more people.

“Integris Health’s expertise in complex clinical services, combined with its experiences in value-based care, offers an opportunity to continue improving health and affordability for the people of Oklahoma.”

Timothy Pehrson, Integris Health’s CEO, said:

“Becoming part of Risant Health is about delivering on our mission — partnering with people to live healthier lives — but faster. This will be done by adding resources, proven value-based care capabilities, and investments in our hospitals and clinics, in growth, in technology, and in the clinical enablers that will help our physicians and nurses serve our communities better.”

With Risant Health as its corporate parent, Integris Health will keep its name and brand, as well as its leadership team and medical staff.  

Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Although the announcement did not state an anticipated window for completing the acquisition, Fierce Healthcare reported that the deal could close early next year. The transaction will require regulatory review.

Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, a subsidiary of Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente, created Risant Health as a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., with the goal of expanding the adoption of value-based care across community-based health systems. Kaiser Permanente launched Risant in April 2023.

Danville, Pa.-based Geisinger Health became Risant’s inaugural health system in March 2024. Risant then acquired Greensboro, N.C.-based Cone Health in December 2024.

Our Take: Integris told KOCO, a local news affiliate, in April that it expects net revenue losses of about $130 million in 2026, due to anticipated cuts in Medicare and Medicaid funding under the “Big Beautiful Bill” passed last year.

The health system said it was taking proactive steps, such as closing certain services and reducing its staff, to ensure its sustainability.

Integris reported net operating losses of $25.1 million for FY 2024 and $22.3 million for FY 2025, along with a decrease in net revenue from $26.8 million in 2024 to just $12 million in 2025. (Integris’ fiscal year ends on June 30.)

Joining Risant Health could provide the financial stability Integris needs, and the acquisition would allow Risant to expand its footprint into the Midwest. Risant did not specify how much it plans to invest in Integris.  

Risant noted that wait times in Geisinger Community Medical Center’s emergency department have improved significantly and clinicians at Cone Health are spending less time on clinical documentation thanks to an ambient assistant. These are the sort of operational improvements Risant could bring to Integris.

When Risant was launched, Kaiser Permanente’s goal was to add five or six regional health systems to Risant’s portfolio in roughly a five-year period. After bringing Geisinger and Cone Health on board in 2024, Risant said it planned to add three or four more “leading community-based health systems” over the next four to five years.

What else you need to know

Cencora signed a definitive agreement to acquire American Oncology Network (AON), a Fort Myers, Fla.-based, physician-led management services organization (MSO) representing more than 350 providers and spanning 21 states. Cencora already holds an equity stake in AON of approximately 4%. The deal to acquire the remaining equity interests puts AON’s enterprise value at $2.4 billion — with $2.3 billion to be paid at closing and up to $100 million in contingent value rights to be paid if certain conditions are satisfied.

Cencora noted in the announcement that certain AON stockholders could choose to roll over their equity and retain up to 25% ownership of AON. In that scenario, Cencora would pay an estimated $1.7 billion to increase its ownership in AON to 75%. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals. AON’s board has given its approval.

The deal is similar to one Cencora completed early this year when it acquired majority ownership of OneOncology, also a physician-led MSO, from TPG and other shareholders for approximately $3.6 billion in cash and $1.3 billion in retired debt. Affiliated practices and management retained a minority stake in OneOncology. Cencora previously owned a 35% minority stake in OneOncology. Becker’s ASC Review, citing investment experts, noted that AON focuses on smaller practices, whereas OneOncology focuses on larger practices.

Cencora’s chief competitors, Cardinal Health and McKesson, have also acquired MSOs and physician groups in recent years.

Prime Therapeutics is shifting to a new point-of-sale rebate model, which it will start offering clients in 2028. Plan members will see the impact of the new arrangements in 2029. The fourth-largest PBM in the U.S. by market share, Prime Therapeutics is owned by 19 Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans. The shift to upfront pricing follows similar moves rival PBMs — CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, and Optum Rx — have made in response to closer scrutiny of traditional PBM business practices, including those involving drug manufacturer discounts. New and smaller PBMs, as well as pharmacies, are skeptical that the revamped rebate models will make any meaningful difference, Modern Healthcare reported.

Epic announced a new feature called Prescription Marketplace that will let clinicians and patients compare prescription drug prices across pharmacies, with and without insurance, before a prescription is sent. Any pharmacy will be able to share its cash prices with health systems that use Epic. The company is partnering with Amazon Pharmacy and Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drugs to develop the tool, which will be released next summer, according to the announcement.

“Putting the lowest cost options, including cash, in the prescriber and patient workflow can help remove one of the biggest barriers to patients taking the medications they need,” said Joel Jones, Epic’s patient safety officer, in an email to MedCity News. Epic already offers a real-time prescription benefit feature that shows physicians how much patients will pay with their insurance and identifies generic alternatives.

GSK’s Hibsago (bepirovirsen) has been approved for treating chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection in combination with existing antiviral therapy. The patient population for which Hibsago is approved includes certain adults without cirrhosis who have been receiving HBV antiviral therapy for at least six months, have suppressed levels of HBV in their blood, and have hepatitis B surface antigens below a specified threshold.

Hibsago is a first-in-class antisense oligonucleotide designed to degrade HBV messenger RNA so the patient’s immune system can gain control again. The drug offers “unprecedented functional cure rates compared to current standard of care,” GSK noted.

The company’s chief scientific officer, Tony Wood, said, “Despite current therapies, many people living with chronic hepatitis B remain on treatment indefinitely and continue to face the risk of serious liver complications. For the first time, with Hibsago, U.S. patients have the potential to achieve functional cure after a six-month treatment course, with the added convenience of the option of self-administration after the first dose.”

Hibsago is administered via subcutaneous injection. GSK has not yet disclosed the drug’s list price.

AI developments

OpenAI acquired Orchestra Bio, an AI-powered platform used to help coordinate drug development. Scientists and leaders of drug development programs use the platform’s AI agents to monitor and track studies and campaigns, freeing up their time for other vital processes, OpenAI explained in the announcement. In addition, the platform’s AI agents can assist teams in identifying activities and timelines that may be affected by issues within a drug program and help them compare their response options. The company said it would pair Orchestra Bio’s team and technology with Rosalind, OpenAI’s suite of models and tools for life sciences research. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Meanwhile, Iowa’s attorney general, Brenna Bird, filed a lawsuit against OpenAI. Bird said in a news release that OpenAI violated Iowa’s Consumer Fraud Act by representing ChatGPT as safe, even though the AI chatbot is “giving dangerous medical advice, encouraging people to hurt others, and coaching people to commit suicide.” Iowa is not the only state suing OpenAI. Bird’s office identified seven other states that have initiated legal action against the company.

Separately, in a report updated on Oct. 15, OpenAI said an internal AI model used a file-download feature on a government statistics website to retrieve information, “including sensitive credentials,” which it then used to retrieve data that had been repeatedly denied.

The breach occurred on June 17 during reinforcement-learning training, OpenAI said. The model had been asked to find a district’s hospital-bed statistics for a single year. When access was denied, the model started trying to bypass the site’s authorization checks. Eventually, the model successfully exploited the site’s “security flaws” and obtained the data it sought (while saving 24 years’ worth of data, Becker’s Hospital Review reported). By this point, the model had already found, through a public search, the data it had been tasked with retrieving.

OpenAI discovered the breach on Aug. 13, following the Hugging Face incident in July, by retrospectively applying its misalignment monitoring system. The company said it has taken several steps in response, including strengthening its security controls.

What we’re reading

When Hospital Revenue Is Constrained, What Should Give? Health Affairs, 10.16.26

Don't fix surgery's Medicare cut problem on primary care's back. Medical Economics, 10.23.25

The State of Health Insurance Coverage in 2026. The Commonwealth Fund, 10.22.26