Hospitals have been buying up physicians' practices at a record clip. But Modern Healthcare flags a new study that found the quality of care isn't improving as a result.
Details: The study compared doctors who were employed by the hospital where they practiced against doctors who contracted with their hospitals.
There was no difference in readmission rates between the two groups, and they performed equally well on 21 out of 29 specific quality measures.
Furthermore, hospitals in highly concentrated markets received lower satisfaction scores from their patients.
"There are less incentives to keep patients happy when they don't have a competitor down the road to go to," Marah Short, the study's lead author, told Modern Healthcare.
The bottom line: All this consolidation doesn't appear to be improving quality — and it's not lowering costs, either.
