LHC Group, Inc. (LHCG)

LHC Group, Inc. provided health care in patients' homes and communities. Its services included home health nursing and therapy, hospice care, home and community-based personal care, and facility-based services such as long-term acute care hospitals. Many of its locations were run as joint ventures with hospitals and health systems, which referred patients after discharge. Medicare was its largest source of payment.

The company was founded in Louisiana in 1994 by Keith Myers and grew from a single home health agency into one of the largest providers in the United States. It went public on Nasdaq under the ticker LHCG in 2005. Growth came from opening new locations and from many acquisitions of smaller agencies across the South and then the rest of the country.

In 2018 LHC Group merged with Almost Family, another large home health operator, which roughly doubled its size. By 2021 the company operated more than 960 locations in 37 states and reported about $2.2 billion in revenue, making it a leading player as payers and hospitals pushed more care out of the hospital and into the home. Its scale gave it bargaining power with payers.

UnitedHealth Group agreed in March 2022 to buy LHC Group for $170 per share in cash, in a deal valued at about $5.4 billion. Regulators asked for more information, which delayed the closing. The shares last traded on Nasdaq on February 21, 2023, and UnitedHealth announced the completion of the deal on February 22. LHC Group became part of Optum's home and community care business.