When a hospital is acquired by a private equity firm, a new study found that emergency room deaths increase, according to a review by researchers from Harvard Medical School, the University of Chicago and the University of Pittsburgh.
The report, “Hospital Staffing and Patient Outcomes After Private Equity Acquisition,” published this month in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found that an increase in deaths was attributed to reductions in full-time employees and cuts to salary expenditures.
The research found that private equity-owned hospitals reduced emergency department and intensive care unit salary expenditures by 18.2% and 15.9%, respectively, relative to non-PE-owned hospitals, while hospital-wide expenditures were reduced by 16.6%, and the number of hospital-wide full-time employees were reduced by 11.6%.
Emergency department units at private equity-owned hospitals experienced an additional seven deaths per 10,000 visits post-acquisition, according to the research—a 13.4% increase from a baseline of 52.4 deaths per 10,000 visits.
For more stories like this, sign up for the CIO Alert newsletter. ?
The research found no increase in mortality rates in intensive care units, but observed that patients in EDs and ICUs saw increases of 4.2% and 10%, respectively, in transfers to other acute care hospitals after being acquired.
“After private equity acquisition, hospitals on average reduced salaries and staffing relative to nonacquired hospitals, notably in the EDs and ICUs, which are higher-acuity and staffing-sensitive areas,” the paper stated. “A decreased capacity to deliver care may explain the increased patient transfers to other hospitals, shortened ICU lengths of stay, and increased ED mortality.”
The paper compared more than 1 million ED and 121,080 ICU hospitalizations across 49 private equity-owned hospitals with more than 6.1 million ED and 760,377 ICU hospitalizations across 293 matched control hospitals. The paper examined 100% Medicare Part A and B claims and cost report data for the period between 2009 and 2019.
There were 488 private equity-owned hospitals in the U.S., as of April, according to the nonprofit watchdog The Private Equity Stakeholder Project, which found that 8.5% of all private hospitals are owned by PE firms, as well as 22.6% of all for-profit hospitals and 27.7% of rural hospitals.
In January, a report from the U.S. Senate Committee on the Budget alleged that private equity ownership of hospitals and health care systems resulted in a decline in the quality of patient care, higher prices, an increase in transfers to other hospitals and a decrease in staffing.
Related Stories:
Private Equity Ownership Degrades Health Care Quality, per Senate Report
Investor Group Calls for UnitedHealth to Report Public Health Costs of Denied Access to Treatment
How Private Equity Damages Health Care, Jobs, Pensions, Report Contends
Tags: Private Equity
#Hospital #Ownership #Led #Increase #Patient #Deaths #Research #Finds