Healthscope has appointed restructuring experts at KordaMentha to prepare a contingency plan in case the country’s second-largest private hospital operator is placed into voluntary administration.

The company was acquired by Canadian investment giant Brookfield in 2019 but has struggled under a debt pile that has reached $1.6 billion. Healthscope has been negotiating with its lenders and has previously warned it may have breached the conditions of those loans.