Study: Hospitals Not Suffering from Specialty Hospitals

In a study from the Center for Studying Health System Change, competition from specialty hospitals — long accused of ‘cherry-picking’ profitable patients and services from hospitals — have not translated into actual financial challenges for the general hospitals.

According to Modern Healthcare, in Indianapolis, Phoenix and Little Rock, Ark. — the three markets analyzed in the study — researchers found general hospitals reported little, if any, change in patient acuity because of competition with a specialty competitor. In cases where there was a change, respondents usually attributed it to the rising numbers of uninsured patients in the market.