Pennant Group (Nasdaq: PNTG) is contemplating joint ventures and acquisitions following its $146.5 million acquisition of Amedisys’ house care and hospice property.

The issues for a three way partnership and extra M&A come as Pennant continues to combine Amedisys’ property – a course of that’s not with out challenges. The corporate has transitioned two of the 5 waves of operations to its programs and the combination will proceed by means of October, management mentioned Thursday in the course of the firm’s Q1 earnings name.

“Regardless of the anticipated challenges of sustaining the census throughout an EMR transition, decrease seasonal entry tendencies in the course of the holidays and extreme climate situations in January, we efficiently recovered and elevated the whole census above the extent on the time of acquisition,” mentioned Brent Guerisoli, CEO and Chairman of Pennant. “Whilst we proceed to implement our programs and enterprise mannequin and anticipate additional disruptions, we’re happy that the transition is progressing in step with our expectations. The longer term seems shiny for Pennant within the South East.”

Integrating these house well being and hospice companies is the corporate’s major focus, mentioned John Gochnour, president and chief working officer. As the combination course of continues, the corporate will nonetheless take into account a pipeline of house well being and hospice acquisitions and joint ventures with built-in well being care programs, he mentioned.

“As we discover alternatives that meet our disciplined standards and won’t distract from our integration efforts, we anticipate to pursue them within the coming months,” Gochnour mentioned.

Hospitals are open to joint ventures, Gochnour added.

“As hospitals have skilled a few of the points that each one of us in healthcare have skilled from a labor perspective, and their want to remain sharp and serve probably the most acute sufferers who can solely obtain care in that setting, they’ve seen the worth of working with an skilled associate,” he mentioned. “And we predict we have constructed a reasonably spectacular monitor file as a associate.”

Eagle, Idaho-based Pennant is a holding firm of independently operated subsidiaries that present house well being and hospice companies, in addition to senior residing communities, in 17 states.

The corporate accomplished the acquisition of house well being, hospice and private care businesses that have been divested as a part of UnitedHealth Group’s (NYSE: UNH) acquisition of Amedisys in October 2025. The deal included 54 areas in Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama.

In response to the 2025 acquisitions, Pennant’s management is inserting nice emphasis on management growth.

“The most important acquisitions we accomplished in 2025 have pushed us to extend our recruiting and growth energy like by no means earlier than,” mentioned Guerisoli. “In 2025, we added 101 CEOs in coaching to our growth program, and have added 47 extra to date in 2026. Additionally in 2025, we appointed 11 native CEOs and 24 different native C-level leaders. Our management pipeline stays sturdy and positions us nicely for added progress sooner or later.”

Within the first quarter, Pennant’s whole income was $285.4 million, up 36% yr over yr. The house well being and hospice section accounted for $229.1 million, up 43% from the primary quarter of 2025.

Pennant management joined many different house care stakeholders in praising the second Trump administration’s concentrate on fraud, waste and abuse. Nonetheless, Gochnour warned that a few of the instruments the federal government is utilizing are “pretty blunt devices” and inspired a nuanced method.

Efforts to root out dangerous actors are literally a possible tailwind in a few of the firm’s markets.

“As there was, for instance, in California or Arizona, the place aggressive enforcement actions have occurred, that has opened or reopened new alternatives for our businesses which might be longstanding components of these communities which have delivered wonderful scientific high quality and deep compliant partnership,” Gochnour mentioned. “So there are alternatives for us as dangerous actors are being weeded out. And so we see that as a possible alternative.”

Firm management additionally made optimistic feedback concerning the firm’s payer partnerships, noting that Pennant has invested a major quantity in its payer relations staff and has superior its conversations with “main payers.” Pennant additionally reported receiving optimistic Medicare-like reimbursements below his managed care contracts.