Durham, N.C.-based Duke Health and Raleigh, N.C.-based Pinnacle Health Services may soon see the end of a long-standing legal battle over a certificate of need for a new magnetic resonance imaging machine in Wake County now that the matter has moved to the state Supreme Court, The Carolina Journal reported Sept. 17.
In 2021, the state health department awarded the certificate of need to Duke, giving it the sole right to purchase and use a new MRI machine in Wake County. Pinnacle Health challenged the decision and argued it should be given the certificate of need since it wanted to use the machine in an area without one. In 2022, a state administrative law judge ruled that healthcare regulators made legal errors when choosing Duke and awarded the CON to Pinnacle. In 2023, the state appeals court affirmed the decision, but Duke Health asked the state Supreme Court to overturn it.
"An executive agency told Pinnacle that it could not install a fixed MRI scanner in Wake Forest, even though that geographic area is currently served by zero such scanners and even though Pinnacle demonstrated that it could provide the service at lower cost than other providers," Pinnacle's lawyers wrote in a March brief. "The agency instead let Duke add a fixed MRI scanner to its facility in the heart of Raleigh, where Duke and other providers already have a bevy of scanners available for the public."
The North Carolina Supreme Court heard arguments in mid-September but has not yet made a ruling.