Study Finds Private Equity Hospital Owners Typically Exit in 5 Years
A study published Sept. 10 in Health Affairs Scholar finds most private equity firms that buy U.S. short-term acute care hospitals sell them within five years, with PE-owned hospitals making up less than 4% of the market in 2024. Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis, Duke, UC Berkeley, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Indiana University analyzed 556 hospitals acquired in 139 majority-stake PE deals from 2000 to 2024. PE hospital ownership peaked near 7% in 2011, driven largely by HCA Healthcare's buyout, and has held between 2% and 4% since HCA's IPO, with no growth since 2018. The authors note the study only describes ownership patterns and does not assess how PE ownership affects quality, cost, or access to care, areas they call an active and sometimes conflicting research field.