Our Research in the Media

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Consolidation in California’s Health Care Market 2010-2016:
Impact on Prices and ACA Premiums,” a paper published by the Petris Center in 2018 was featured in a CHCF Blog Post on March 1, 2019. The post, titled “The Price Isn’t Right,” included this report as evidence supporting consolidation leading to higher prices. The report found that 44 of California’s 58 counties have highly concentrated hospital markets and six others have moderately concentrated hospital markets. The Petris Center has continued to study consolidation and its impact on prices.

Read the full blog post here.

Read the report here.

Richard Scheffler and Steven Shortell’s letter-to-the-editor and paper “The Seven Percent Solution: Costing and Financing Universal Health Coverage in California” was featured in a February 24th opinion piece in the New York Times. The letter addresses the possibility to implement universal care in California via a public/private model. Given that Medicare-for-All will be in the spotlight during the 2020 election, it is important to consider alternatives to achieving universal coverage.

To see the full letter, click here

In a December 27th article published in the Wall Street Journal, the Petris Center contributed an analysis demonstrating the growing trends for physicians being employed by hospitals rather than by medical groups or independent practices, seen in a graphic in the article. The article provides insight into the increasingly higher costs of care when provided by a hospital group as compared to a doctor’s office. It also points to doctors referring their patients to hospitals that they are affiliated with, despite the higher costs for not only the insurer, but in out-of-pocket costs for patients. This article describes the growing trend of hospital acquisitions of physician groups and the resulting increase in prices for patients, but it mainly focuses on the knowledge asymmetry of doctors referring patients to a more expensive option they are affiliated with and often times are “required” by their employer to recommend.

Read the full article here

Health Affairs article by Brent D. Fulton, Petris Center, UC Berkeley 

In a November 14th article by Reed Abelson of the New York Times, the Petris Center provided analysis that forms the basis of the piece’s discussion of hospital mergers and their effects on consumer prices. The article relies on data and case studies that compare regions with varying levels of hospital consolidation and how the prices in that hospital changed in relation to averages for the area. Ultimately, the article shows that these increased trends toward consolidation are costing patients more, as demonstrated in studies of metropolitan areas throughout the Northeast, Pacific Northwest, South, and Texas.

Although California metropolitan areas are not featured in the article itself, this research plays an important role in the state, with CA Attorney General Xavier Becerra claiming that one has to “watch for these systems throwing their weight around… we are looking for cases where consolidation does nothing for efficiency and leads to distortions of the market.” Earlier in 2018, Becerra’s office moved to sue Sutter Health, a sprawling system in the northern part of the state for these very reasons.

The article also discusses merger volume trends in both hospitals and the acquisition of physician medical groups, which Petris Center Director Dr. Richard Scheffler argues is a crucial factor that causes “prices to rise even more steeply.” Scheffler continues to describe the “enormous impact” of sharing a large market in a metropolitan area, when large hospital systems exert their market influence.

Read the full New York Times article here.

A recent article by the Daily Californian, “UC Berkeley study finds link between hospital consolidation, higher prices for patients,” cites the Petris Center’s September report that shows an association between a rise in ACA premiums and increasing hospital consolidation in Northern California.

The piece quotes Petris Center Director Dr. Richard Scheffler and shows that the “price increases that we document in this study have real relevance for the Berkeley community,” and that hospital consolidation in the Bay Area has led to “many physician groups now owned by hospitals or health systems.” Scheffler’s comments indicate that more attention from regulators and legislators is key in the future.

Check out the rest of the Daily Cal article here.

Read the full Petris report here.