In the article “As Hospital Systems Grow, Their Profits Shrink, Report Finds,” Modern Healthcare turned to Chicago partner Neil Olderman for his thoughts on a 2018 report that showed a decrease in health system mergers and acquisitions.
The publication reports that while hospital transactions rose rapidly from 2003 to 2017, they trailed off in 2018. Ninety hospital and health system mergers and acquisitions were announced in 2018, down from 115 in 2017 and the lowest mark since 2011, according to Kaufman Hall data.
“A little bit of the air has come out on the super aggressive ‘if you are not partnering you are dying’ model,” Olderman told Modern Healthcare.
Deterred by some buyers who bit off more than they could chew, executives are asking if an arms race is the solution and are more frequently turning to less-formal affiliations, he said.