Northeast Georgia Health System’s (NGHS) CEO Matt Hanley spoke on WDUN’s “The Martha Zoller Show” Tuesday morning, discussing a number of issues ranging from the upcoming acquisition of Longstreet Clinic to improvements to the system’s emergency care.

Click play on the video above for the full interview.

On the acquisition of Longstreet Clinic:

NGHS officials announced in 2025 that the health system would be integrating Gainesville-based Longstreet Clinic into it in early 2026. That acquisition was briefly put on hold after NGHS officials said they learned one of Longstreet’s physicians was under a federal inquiry.

However, in December, NGHS announced that the merger was back on and slated for early 2026. Hanley said the current goal is to bring Longstreet under the NGHS umbrella in February.

“There’s a ton of people doing work in the integrations and getting ready for February, and we’re all really excited,” Hanley said. “I think that what we look forward to is the fact that, together, we have more possibilities of continuing to build things like clinical programs that were harder to do before and continue to provide care like we’ve doing in the community.”

On how growth in the area has impacted the health system:

Hanley said NGHS has accelerated expansion plans at both its Gainesville and Braselton campuses of Northeast Georgia Medical Center (NGMC) due to continued population growth in the region. He noted that the new Green Tower on the NGMC Gainesville campus has now been open for nearly a year, and that NGMC Braselton has added hundreds of parking spots and more pharmacy and infrastructure space.

He also said that population growth has led to more competition with other Metro Atlanta-based health care systems, which he said can affect which services NGHS decides to develop or expand.

“The community always comes first…So I think about it from that perspective,” Hanley said. “As an example, would we necessarily put together a pediatric intensive care unit? I’d have to think really hard and fast about that, because we’ve got (Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta) 45 minutes down the road, and it makes sense for the community, broadly, to have an organization who that’s all they do…So no, that would be a place where I’d say, I’m not going to compete against them. Then I stand back and say, okay, so what do we need to do for the community?”

On healthcare affordability and insurance issues:

Hanley said he believes healthcare affordability and insurance premiums are among the biggest economic issues in the country. He said he believes state and federal lawmakers need to take steps to help bring prices down.

“I think we’ve got to address it on the macro level, structurally,” Hanley said. “Underpinning where (insurance companies) are setting their premiums is the cost of hospitals, the cost of physicians, the cost of technology and the cost of pharmacy…We have to work structurally on the state level, and then everyone in the healthcare space has to do their own responsibility in terms of driving the affordability agenda, and I think it’s on three different levels. It’s the business model, it’s the payment model, and then it’s the care model.”

On improvements to NGHS’s emergency care:

Hanley said improving the efficiency of the system’s emergency care, especially at the larger NGMC facilities in Gainesville and Braselton, has been one of his priorities since taking over in early 2025.

He said it has taken some time for the emergency room operation at NGMC Gainesville to adjust to the new Green Tower facility that opened in 2025, but he said he still wants to see efficiency improve there.

“Healthcare is really hard. It’s really messy…Smaller facilities will always be more efficient than bigger level-one trauma centers,” Hanley said. “We’ll never offer that as an excuse for not being efficient or offering high customer service. I’ll also be the first to say, we have work to do, and it’s a big focus of us right now, in terms of the efficiency of the new facility.”