title: Hospitals for sale.
abstract: The pace of hospital merger and acquisition activity reflects the economic theory of supply and demand: Publicly traded hospital companies, private equity funds, and large nonprofit hospital systems are investing capital to purchase and operate freestanding community hospitals at a time when many of those hospitals find themselves short of capital reserves and certain forms of management expertise. But the sale of those community hospitals also raises questions about the impact of absentee ownership on the communities which those hospitals serve.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Administration and Human Resources, University of Scranton, USA.
authors.forename: Michael M
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Costello
authors.forename: Daniel J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: West
authors.forename: Bernardo
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Ramirez
mesh_terms: D003659:Decision Making, Organizational; D006273:Health Facility Merger / Q000191:economics*; D006739:Hospital Administration; D010067:Ownership; D014481:United States