Beyond Prescription Drug Costs On August 16, 2022, President Joseph Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) into law. The broad bill, which covers healthcare, taxes, and climate change, had been passed around Congress in assorted versions with varying support for months, but under the specter of a record 40-year-high inflation rate, congressional Democrats ultimately came together to pass the ...

Valuation Implications Over the past couple of months, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released the proposed rules for several of its payment schedules, indicating the state of healthcare reimbursement for the next year. This article briefly summarizes these proposed payment rules and discusses their significance to healthcare valuation professionals. The U.S. government is the larges ...

A Shake-up in the Evolution of the Healthcare Industry? As covered in a May 2021, NACVA QuickRead article, special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) began tremendous growth in 2020 and looked to be a new mainstream avenue of investing. Two years later, the growth of SPACs across all industries, including healthcare, has plateaued and appears to be dropping in some industries. This article will examine h ...

Indications for 2022 After an understandable slowdown in 2020, due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, merger and acquisition (M&A) activity in the healthcare industry accelerated in 2021, and the industry is expected to continue the high number of deals and high deal volume in 2022. This article will review the U.S. healthcare industry’s M&A activity in 2021 and discuss what these trends may mea ...

RAND Corporation 2022 Study Published in JAMA A study conducted by the RAND Corporation and published in the January 2022 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) seeking to determine whether health systems primarily incentivize volume or value in their physician compensation models found that almost all physicians are still compensated through a volume-based model that rewards produc ...

Center for Medicare & Medicaid Publishes Proposed and Final Rules on Medical Reimbursement Rates The U.S. government is the largest payor of medical costs, through Medicare and Medicaid, and consequently has a strong influence on physician reimbursement. The prevalence of these public payors in the healthcare marketplace often results in their acting as a price setter and being used as a benchmark for p ...

This article discusses the recent settlement of National Spine and Pain Center signed with the U.S. Department of Justice and provides the basis to discuss the importance of obtaining an opinion regarding the FMV physician compensation. On August 6, 2021, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it had reached a settlement with National Spine and Pain Center, LLC (NSPC), a Maryland physician management ...

Analysis of Deal Stats Pre- and Post-COVID-19 This article will review PE activity generally, and in the healthcare industry, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and discuss what is expected for the remainder of 2021, as the economy evolves in response to a post-pandemic America. The involvement of private equity (PE) in the healthcare industry in the first quarter of 2021 disappointed investors after the number ...

Healthcare Valuation 2021 Update The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted nearly all businesses and is poised to continue to do so through at least the end of 2021. In healthcare, there has been additional issues due to the industry’s unique position at the crossroads of the front line of care and policy response. As of January 19, 2021, important updates have gone into effect concerning the two most significant ...

An Alternative to the IPO The popularity of special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) has been soaring in recent years. There are 35 times as many SPACs operating in 2020 as in 2010, and these companies seem poised for greater exponential growth in the future. While many experts are predicting a continued, rapid increase in SPACs, this article will also examine the factors that could possibly slow SPAC ...

Valuation Implications On November 20, 2020, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a final rule to modernize and clarify the Stark Law. The Stark Law governs those physicians (or their immediate family members) who have a financial relationship with an entity, and prohibits those individuals from making Medicare referrals to those entities for the provision of designated health servi ...

Technology (Part V of V) As noted in the first installment of this five-part series, an ambulatory surgery center (ASC) is a distinct entity that primarily provides outpatient surgical procedures to patients who do not require an overnight stay after the procedure. ASCs typically provide relatively uncomplicated surgical procedures in a non-hospital, outpatient setting, and most ASC cases are non-emergency, ...

Regulatory (Part IV of V) As noted in the first installment of this five-part series, an ambulatory surgery center (ASC) is a distinct entity that primarily provides outpatient surgical procedures to patients who do not require an overnight stay after the procedure. ASCs typically provide relatively uncomplicated surgical procedures in a non-hospital, outpatient setting, and most ASC cases are non-emergency ...

Reimbursement (Part III of V) As noted in the first installment of this five-part series, an ambulatory surgery center (ASC) is a distinct entity that primarily provides outpatient surgical procedures to patients who do not require an overnight stay after the procedure. The facilities typically provide relatively uncomplicated surgical procedures in a non-hospital, outpatient setting, and most ASC cases are ...

Competition (Part II of V) This second installment in this five-part series on the valuation of ASCs will discuss the competitive environment of ASCs, by competitor type. [su_pullquote align="right"]Resources:Valuation of Ambulatory Surgery Centers—Introduction (Part I of V)[/su_pullquote] As noted in the first installment of this five-part series, an ambulatory surgery center (ASC) is a distinct entity tha ...

Introduction (Part I of V) Ambulatory surgery centers (ASC) grew dramatically until 2008 and during the growth period provided services previously only available at hospitals. In this five-part series, the authors first discuss the emergence and decline of ASCs, the forces driving growth and contraction, and how the ASC business model differs from that of hospitals. The remaining articles in this series dis ...

Technology (Part V of V) Over the past decade, there has been a rapid adoption of technological innovations in the U.S., which has fundamentally changed the healthcare delivery system, improving the quality of patient care, as well as the efficiency of healthcare processes and practices. Research indicates that implementation of healthcare information technology (HIT) may lead to improved efficiency and qua ...

Regulatory Issues (Part IV of V) As discussed in the first installment of this five-part series, rural health clinics (RHCs) are statutorily-created entities, established via the Rural Health Clinic Service Act of 1977. These providers face a range of federal and state legal and regulatory constraints, which affect their formation, operation, and transactions. This installment will discuss two important reg ...

Reimbursement Environment (Part III of V) The U.S. government is the largest payor of medical costs, through Medicare and Medicaid, and has a strong influence on healthcare reimbursement. In 2017, Medicare and Medicaid accounted for an estimated $705.9 billion and $581.9 billion in healthcare spending, respectively. The prevalence of these public payors in the healthcare marketplace often results in their a ...

For Rural Health Clinics Competition (Part II of V) As discussed in the first installment of this five-part series regarding Rural Health Clinics (RHCs), the significant proportion of RHCs operating at a loss has led to an overall reduction in the number of RHCs. Despite this decrease, the demand for RHCs continues to rise, limiting access to care for patients in rural communities. This second installment w ...