How Has Hospital Consolidation Affected the Price and Quality of Hospital Care?

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Abstract:

A wave of hospital mergers and acquisitions in the 1990s transformed the inpatient hospital market. By 2003, almost 90 percent of people living in the nation's larger urban areas faced highly concentrated markets. Stakeholders and policy-makers have raised concerns about this consolidation trend, pointing to potential impacts on health care costs and quality. This synthesis analyzes the drivers of consolidation and evidence on how it has affected hospital prices, cost and quality.