Health economics
2026-04-26
11 minute read
23 sources
US healthcare private equity rollup at the antitrust inflection: physician practices, hospital chapter 11, and the 2026 refi wall
PE healthcare deal value has settled into the 80 to 100 billion dollar a year band after the 2021 peak, even as Envision and Steward have proven the LBO model can break, and the FTC, DOJ, and a growing list of state attorneys general are now writing rules around physician rollups.
Private equity ownership in US healthcare reached an inflection point between 2023 and 2026. Pitchbook tallied roughly 1,049 PE healthcare deals in 2024 with disclosed value near 115 billion dollars, well below the 2021 peak. KKR backed Envision Healthcare filed for chapter 11 in May 2023, wiping out about 7 billion dollars of equity. Cer...