Manuel J. Santos Hospital Acquires VCDU Prince Hotel

Santos Clinic, Inc. (SCI), owner and operator of Manuel J. Santos Hospital (MJSH), has acquired the adjacent 7-storey VCDU Prince Hotel in a bid to ramp up the expansion of its healthcare services available for the communities of Butuan and the CARAGA Region.

Photo Insert: An aerial view of VCDU Prince Hotel in Butuan City

MJSH is a 100-bed Level 2 hospital located along Montilla Boulevard corner National Highway in Butuan City. After its founding in 1933, MJSH became a member of the country’s largest private hospital network of Metro Pacific Hospital Holdings, Inc. (MPHHI) in 2019.

MJSH plans to convert the hotel to a Medical Arts Building (MAB) to house its existing doctors and enable MJSH to offer new clinic spaces to its growing roster of medical consultants.

The hotel will also be refurbished to further provide diagnostics and modern outpatient services for its customers. The clinics in the main hospital to be vacated by existing doctors who will move to the new MAB will be converted to patient rooms, thereby increasing its authorized bed capacity by 25 starting in 2022.

“When we partnered with MPHHI, we knew that we were getting the commitment needed to make the best healthcare possible available in Butuan and CARAGA.” said Dr. Terence ‘Ompet’ S. Vesagas, a member of the founding family and Chief Operating Officer of MJSH. This transaction exemplifies MPHHI’s continuing desire to upgrade and expand the available healthcare services in all its member hospitals.

“Today mounts a momentous occasion for MJSH as this purchase allows us to expand our services offerings to more Butuanons while making sure our doctors can care for our patients in the best environment possible,” remarked Mr. Celso Bernard “Oslec” G. Lopez, President and CEO of MJSH.

Mr. Lopez, who also serves as President and CEO of the 3 other MPHHI hospitals in Mindanao, namely Davao Doctors Hospital, West Metro Medical Center in Zamboanga City, and St. Elizabeth Hospital in General Santos City, added “All our Mindanao hospitals have also expanded their services and footprint through their new Primary Care Centers, which are 24/7 one-stop-shop facilities for outpatient healthcare services.”

Meanwhile, MPHHI President Augusto P. Palisoc, Jr. said, “We consider Mindanao as an island with great potential, so we continue to look for more hospital partnerships where we can contribute our capital, management and group synergies, to enable all our partner hospitals to sooner realize their full potential. Through this, we hope we can do our share to help in the development of Mindanao”

“Our operational strategy in Mindanao has always been to take advantage of the geography and let our hospitals there work together as a cluster.” remarked MPHHI CEO Dr. Harish Pillai, who also added, “By leveraging shared knowledge and resources, we hope to make better healthcare services available to the residents of Mindanao.”

For MPHHI Chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan, the acquisition of the hotel’s assets by MJSH conveys the ultimate goal of nation-building by MPHHI and Metro Pacific Investments Corporation (MPIC), “Our goal at Metro Pacific has always been about nation-building, and it is no different with our hospital group. With a clear vision of what we want to achieve, we can turn underutilized assets and convert them to facilities that offer essential services to our fellow Filipinos. This is what this asset purchase is all about.”

The rest of MPHHI’s nationwide portfolio of hospitals include 9 Metro Manila hospitals --- Makati Medical Center, Asian Hospital, Cardinal Santos Medical Center, Manila Doctors Hospital, De Los Santos Medical Center, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Marikina Valley Medical Center, Jesus Delgado Memorial Hospital, and Commonwealth Hospital and Medical Center --- and 6 other provincial hospitals --- Central Luzon Doctors’ Hospital in Tarlac, Sacred Heart Hospital in Malolos, Bulacan, Calamba Medical Center, Los Baños Doctors Hospital, Riverside Medical Center in Bacolod, and Ramiro Community Hospital in Bohol.

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