Dr Robert Galvin to Join Blackstone as CEO of Equity Healthcare

August 05, 2010

August 05, 2010

New York, NY – The Blackstone Group (NYSE: BX) today announced that Dr Robert Galvin had joined the firm as the Chief Executive Officer of Equity Healthcare. Equity Healthcare is Blackstone’s health management program to both improve quality and contain costs in providing health care to the employees and their families of private equity portfolio companies. Currently Equity Healthcare encompasses 34 companies, the combined healthcare spending of which exceeds $2 billion annually.

Before joining Blackstone, Dr Galvin was Executive Director of Health Services and Chief Medical Officer for General Electric for fifteen years. There he was in charge of the design and financial and clinical performance of GE’s health programs. He was also responsible for health policy strategies affecting employees. Dr Galvin is a nationally recognized leader in the areas of market-based health policy and financing, quality improvement and payment reform. His work has been widely published in the New England Journal of Medicine and Health Affairs and he was a co-founder of the Leapfrog Group and founder of Bridges to Excellence, two innovative non-profits that have helped drive the quality agenda.

Stephen A. Schwarzman, Blackstone’s Chairman and CEO, commenting on the appointment, said: “We are delighted that someone of Dr Galvin’s outstanding expertise and stature has agreed to head Equity Healthcare. This is one of Blackstone’s most important initiatives. Through it, we can show that the private sector is playing a major role in developing market-based solutions to both improving the quality of health care and containing its costs.”

Added Dr Galvin: “Equity Healthcare is one of the most innovative efforts within corporate America to deal with the rapidly increasing cost of health care, while at the same time improving the health and well being of the affected employees and their families. I am excited about leading this effort and making it a model for best-of-class health care delivery in the United States.”

Dr Galvin is on the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Board on Health Care Services and has served on several IOM Committees focused on health reform and quality. He is also on the Board of Directors of the National Quality Forum. Dr Galvin is Professor Adjunct of Medicine and Health Policy at Yale. Dr Galvin’s work has received awards from the National Business Group on Health, the Healthcare Financial Management Association, and the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship. Dr Galvin received his BA and MD from the University of Pennsylvania and holds an MBA from Boston University. He is a fellow of the American College of Physicians.

About Blackstone

Blackstone is one of the world’s leading investment and advisory firms. We seek to create positive economic impact and long-term value for our investors, the companies we invest in, the companies we advise and the broader global economy. We do this through the commitment of our extraordinary people and flexible capital. Our alternative asset management businesses include the management of private equity funds, real estate funds, funds of hedge funds, credit- oriented funds and closed-end mutual funds. The Blackstone Group also provides various financial advisory services, including financial and strategic advisory, restructuring and reorganization advisory and fund placement services. Further information is available at www.blackstone.com.

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