Ardent Health Services has completed its previously announced acquisition of Lovelace Health Systems, Albuquerque, from CIGNA Corp. for $211 million.

The deal includes a 225-bed hospital, a multi-specialty physician group practice, a health plan with roughly 167,000 members. That includes commercial HMO, Medicare and Medicaid consumers.

Excluded from the sale were CIGNA’s indemnity, PPO, and POS businesses serving 73,000 members. The Philadelphia-based insurer retained those assets.

Ardent blended the purchased assets into the Sandia Health System, a system built by the company upon the purchase of a second large-scale acquisition in the Albuquerque market, St. Joseph Healthcare in September 2002. Sandia now spans five hospitals, two physician groups, the Lovelace Health Plan and MedicarePlus Health Plan, S.E.D. Medical Laboratories and 15 primary care centers.

It is the first large-scale, multi-facility purchase completed under the tenure of Chief Executive David Vandewater, former No. 2 at Columbia/HCA. The company now owns 28 hospitals in 13 states ranging from acute care to psychiatric facilities.

New York-based Welsh Carson Anderson & Stowe is the majority owner of Ardent, formerly known as Behavioral Healthcare Corp.