HealthLeaders Media August 16, 2018
Hospitals and health systems join forces to optimize quality and lower costs, but both goals can be hampered by unexpected challenges.
Cost concerns are driving many mergers and acquisitions, but hospital and health system leaders are finding that there are hidden challenges when bringing their operations together.
Left unchecked, those issues can degrade quality of care and threaten the cost savings that motivated the mergers in the first place.
There have been more than 70 deals per year recently, with consolidation occurring mostly in midsize systems (those between $1 billion to $5 billion).
Many of the remaining smaller systems are not attractive acquisition targets, notes Peter Bonis, MD, chief medical officer for clinical effectiveness with Wolters Kluwer Health,...