As the healthcare industry continues to shift toward outpatient care and owners of shopping centers court healthcare providers as tenants, the proliferation of walk-in clinics is not likely to cease anytime soon.
And according to a Reuters article, it is private equity firms who are funding the expansion, looking forward to more acquisitions “because they expect profits to grow as healthcare reforms boost the number of Americans with health insurance by more than 30 million over the next decade.”
Private equity firms invested $4 billion in 2012 in health and medical services, including urgent care, up from $3.5 billion in 2011, according to Thomson Reuters data cited in the article.
The article also cites a study by the Urgent Care Association of America that says the number of clinics in the U.S. climbed almost 20 percent to 9,400 in the last four years. And almost 40 percent of clinics surveyed expect to expand their facilities or add new clinics this year, up from 18 percent in 2010.
And while consumer advocates worry investors will push clinics to focus more on profits than on quality of care, the private equity firms say they help clinics standardize procedures and consolidate overhead costs like billing, the article says.
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