By Don Michak
Journal Inquirer
The federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is expected to make more people able to pay for their health care through new insurance marketplaces, so hospitals presumably will provide less charity care and, as a result, reduce their debt.
That could make Connecticut’s nonprofit hospitals more attractive to for-profit hospital systems and accelerate the consolidation trend occurring across the country.
Healthcare IT News
The fact is, however, that information technology – even if it’s not a direct driver of healthcare consolidation – can certainly be a significant factor in the decision-making of healthcare administrators, affecting both the choice to consolidate and how successfully a consolidation is carried out.
Editor’s Note: It should be noted that overly intrusive government intervention in the healthcare market has a number of unintended consequences like forcing physicians to give up their individual practices and thus join hospitals in order to survive:
“What really drove us to this decision was that the health care business has become so complicated.”
“New payment structures and care models in the Affordable Care Act will make it increasingly difficult for private practices to remain profitable, according to a 2011 paper published by the New England Journal of Medicine.”
Becker’s Hospital Review
Hospital price growth has declined over the past decade and has been consistently outpaced by health insurance premiums, despite concerns that consolidation is increasing prices, according to an American Hospital Association infographic.
Hospital spending is at historic lows, with its growth rate declining from 5.8 percent in 2003 to 1.9 percent in 2013, according to the AHA. Meanwhile, the growth rate for health insurance premiums went from around 13.3 percent in 2003 to 4.5 percent in 2012.
