Cooney/Waters Group has acquired New York-based healthcare and medical PR shop The Corkery Group for $6M.

Lenore Cooney, CEO of CWG who sold the firm to U.K.-based Creston in late 2010, sees the deal for 25-staffer Corkery as the “next stage of growth” for her firm. She sees Corkery’s strength in analysis and health policy complementing CWG’s product marketing experience.

The Corkery Group will continue under that name as a division CWG with offices to be combined next year. Karen O’Malley takes the president title as founder David Corkery slides into a senior advisory role. They are both former staffers of Fenton Communications.

Corkery, which has worked with the American Society of Clinical Oncology, The John M. Lloyd Foundation, Gilead Sciences and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, reported revenues of $6.3M through the first nine months of 2011, off the pace of $9.9M in 2010.