The Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital is considering leasing all or part of its operations to a private company, which would then receive access to the the psychiatric institution's facilities and programs, and any profits it might earn.

The negotiations between McLean and three corporations come in the wake of a failed attempt last fall to sell the Belmont-based psychiatric facility to the largest for-profit health care company in the world. Hospital Corporation of America (HCA).

The controversial move failed when hospital and staff, and doctors at the allied Harvard Medical School blocked the Board of Trustees' sale proposal.

The lease option has not been wholeheartedly endorsed by most doctors, who fear aligning academic hospitals with commercial concerns, but those involved in the negotiations are trying to form an agreement which will meet most of the objections.

Officials at the hospital said three points must be included in any proposal if it is to be acceptable, the hospital must remain nonprofit, it must still be owned by the McLean Hospital Corporation, and the hospital's governance must remain essentially unchanged.

Under the terms being discussed, the leasing company would initially own the building, depreciate it for tax purposes and then sell it to McLean for $1 after 20 years.

A source involved with the negotiations said McLean is talking with three companies HCA. American Medical International and National Medical Enterprises. The source added that most discussions had been with HCA and that the hospital was most likely to conclude a deal with the Nashville-based company.

George Putnam Jr. '49, president of McLean's trustees, said yesterday that the negotiations are still in the early stages, but estimated that any contract would be worth at least $2 million annually.

In such a deal all of the money would go to McLean. One of the major objections opponents of the sale last fall had was that because McLean was created jointly with the Massachusetts General Hospital, all the money from a sale--perhaps as much as $50 million would have gone to the larger hospital.

Administrators said they are interested in working out deal with a company like HCA because it will help them conduct the capital improvement they say the hospital badly needs and will protect the institution from rapidly rising health care costs and increasingly restrictive government regulations.

An HCA spokesman said the company is interested in a contract with McLean because it will give them a training facility for doctors from their other psychiatric hospitals and would be a good place to transfer difficult patients requiring long-term care.

In addition, McLean is hoping to get a private company to build one or more new buildings on the hospital's 150 acre grounds. This is attractive because profit-making companies have more borrowing power than non profit institutions and would take any liability off the hospital.

McLean has asked the state for permission to do $35 million worth of construction and renovation. The work is pending government approval and raising the money Putnam said he thought a private company might contribute up to $25 million.

Although McLean has run in the black in recent years, administrators fear that rising health-care costs, increasingly restrictive government regulations, and the need for long overdue capital improvements may cause a severe fiscal crunch within the next decade.

It is also well-known that HCA covets a Harvard affiliation for its prestige. Aligning with Harvard would make it easier for a company like HCA to affiliate with other teaching hospitals facing similar financial pressures. And, as one of the most respected psychiatric institutions in the country. McLean would be a flagship for the company's psychiatric line, which it is aggressively expanding.