Politico September 23, 2025
INVESTIGATION
The increasing number of private doctors’ practices being acquired is raising concerns that a less competitive market is driving up health care costs, according to a new Government Accountability Office report.
The GAO report focuses on physician consolidation — when independent practices either merge or, more often, are acquired by larger health care organizations. At least 47 percent of physician offices last year were consolidated with hospital systems, meaning they were either employed by a hospital network or worked at a practice that was affiliated with one. That figure has increased in the past decade. In 2012, less than 30 percent of practices were consolidated.
Why is this happening? Doctors’ groups told GAO that consolidation is becoming common partly...
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