The University of Colorado University Hospital was originally created on October 1, 1989, as a
nonprofit corporation pursuant to an act of the Colorado
General Assembly, but the act was declared
unconstitutional by the Colorado
Supreme Court in 1990. It was recreated in 1991 as the University of Colorado Hospital Authority as a special purpose government subdivision of the state. University of Colorado Health was formed on January 31, 2012 (
doing business as UCHealth since 2014), as a
joint operating company between the University of Colorado Hospital Authority and Poudre Valley Health (of
Poudre Valley Hospital). In August 2012, voters in
Colorado Springs approved a special election measure to allow UCHealth to lease and operate Memorial Hospital. In 2015,
Adeptus Health announced a partnership with UCHealth to develop emergency care facilities in
Denver,
Colorado Springs, and
northern Colorado, including 12 existing First Choice emergency rooms along with two new ones. In September 2016, UCHealth Broomfield Hospital opened. Located in Broomfield, Colorado, the hospital has 18 inpatient rooms and a 4-bed intensive care unit. In February 2017, the system retitled itself as UCHealth. In August 2017, a new 51-bed hospital opened in Longmont, Colorado in Boulder County called UCHealth Longs Peak Hospital. In June 2019, the system opened a new hospital in Douglas County called UCHealth Highlands Ranch Hospital. In July 2019, the system opened a new hospital in Weld County called UCHealth Greeley Hospital. On December 1 2023,
Parkview Medical Center in
Pueblo and Parkview Pueblo West Hospital in
Pueblo West merged with UCHealth. In November 2024, it was announced that UCHealth had entered in a $23 million settlement with the
United States Department of Justice over allegations that it had fraudulently billed emergency department patients with
Tricare and
Medicare for higher levels of service than were provided. The case was initiated from a UCHealth revenue auditing employee who filed a whistleblower complaint. As part of the settlement UCHealth had no admission of guilt and made a statement afterward denying wrongdoing, saying that they "agreed to the settlement to avoid potentially lengthy and costly litigation." In 2025 UCHealth v. Colorado Department of HealthCare Policy and Financing (case No. 2024CV32363) documents how UCHealth sued HCPF to reclassify Memorial Central Hospital and Poudre Valley Hospital as private non-profit hospitals to improve the CHASE reimbursement terms (together these hospitals were getting back less money than they put in based on percentage of Medicaid patients). The parties settled with an agreement where HCPF will classify the hospitals as private non-profit because CMS and the state constitution allows definition to be based on operator or owner, and in this case UCHealth is the operator (a private non-profit corporation). == Awards and recognition ==