Christopher Stanley, M.D., MBA, on why Henry Ford Health's Populance is pivoting inward

Populance, the population health subsidiary of Detroit-based Henry Ford Health, has set aside plans to sign up outside customers so it can concentrate on serving a parent organization that has roughly doubled in size. Christopher Stanley, M.D., MBA, president of Populance, said the decision is a recent one and a deliberate strategic choice. Stanley recently joined the editorial advisory board of Managed Healthcare Executive.

Stanley is not concerned that the change will be seen as a setback. Populance and Henry Ford Health never intended to build a business quickly, he said. “

We were always doing this to try to provide more benefit to the communities we serve,” Stanley said.

Henry Ford Health set up Populance as a separate legal entity with its own board and leadership team, with the idea that it would serve both the provider and health plan sides of the system without being seen as belonging to either one, Stanley noted. For now, it has two contracted customers: Henry Ford's clinically integrated network and its health plan. When Populance launched, Stanley said, no one expected that Ascension Michigan's medical groups and hospitals in southeast Michigan would be joining Henry Ford Health. That merger has roughly doubled the size of the provider side of Henry Ford, he said, and added complexity, while the health plan has also roughly doubled. Populance plans to concentrate on its Henry Ford “internal customers’ for the next one to three years before looking outward again to possibly sell its services to other providers and health systems.

As of January 2027, Stanley said, Populance will be involved in managing roughly 1 million patients. That count includes the system’s three accountable care organizations (ACOs), all of which shoulder downside financial risk. as well as its Medicare Shared Savings Program participation.