On February 10, 2014, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court decision, which held that St. Luke’s Health System’s (“St. Luke’s”) acquisition of Saltzer Medical Group (“Saltzer”) violated Section 7 of the Clayton Act. In the first federal appellate court antitrust decision regarding a physician merger, the Ninth Circuit also affirmed the divestiture remedy ordered by the district court.

St. Luke’s was a not-for-profit health system headquartered in Boise, Idaho. It owned and operated six hospitals, as well as a number of other facilities and physician clinics. Prior to being acquired by St. Luke’s, Saltzer was a for-profit, physician-owned, multi-specialty group comprised of 44 physician members and located in Nampa, Idaho (St. Luke’s did not have a hospital in Nampa). Saltzer was also the largest and oldest independent multi-specialty doctors group in Idaho.