Percentage Of Dentists And Dental Practices Affiliated With Private Equity Nearly Doubled, 2015-21.

Over the course of the past twenty years, private equity (PE) has played a role in acquiring medical practices, hospitals, and nursing homes. More recently, PE has taken a greater interest in acquiring dental practices, but few data exist about the scope of PE activity within dentistry. We analyzed dentist provider data for the period 2015-21 to examine trends in PE acquisition of dental practices.

Insurer Market Power And Hospital Prices In The US.

The extent to which concentration in the health insurance market affects negotiated prices paid to hospitals is of high interest to policy makers. We examined the association between insurer market share and hospital prices, using a new source of data obtained through the federal Hospital Price Transparency initiative. We found that the market-leading insurer in the least competitive (most concentrated) insurance markets pays 15 percent less to hospitals than the market-leading insurer in the most competitive (least concentrated) markets.

Does Preventive Care Reduce Severe Pediatric Dental Caries?

Introduction: Tertiary oral health services (caries-related surgery, sedation, and emergency department visits) represent high-cost and ineffective ways to improve a child's oral health. We measured the impact of increased Texas Medicaid reimbursements for preventive dental care on use of tertiary oral health services.

Methods: We used difference-in-differences models to compare the effect of a policy change among children (≤9 y) enrolled in Medicaid in Texas and Florida.

A Cross-Sectional Analysis of Community Water Fluoridation and Prevalence of Pediatric Dental Surgery Among Medicaid Enrollees.

Importance: Dental surgery under general anesthesia (DGA) is an ineffective, costly treatment for caries. Interventions to reduce the need for DGA are challenging because children's parents may not seek care until surgery is required. Community water fluoridation (CWF) effectively prevents early childhood caries, but its effectiveness in reducing severe early childhood caries is unknown.

Wellness Programs With Financial Incentives Through Disparities Lens.

Purpose: To examine wellness programs with financial incentives and their effect on disparities in preventive care.

Design: Financial incentives were introduced by 15 large employers, from 2010 to 2013.

Setting: Fifteen private employers.

Boosting workplace wellness programs with financial incentives.

Objectives: Using a large natural experiment among 39 employers, we examined the effect of adding financial incentives to workplace wellness programs.

Study Design: The 39 study employers used the same national insurer to administer their wellness programs, allowing us to observe preventive and health-promoting behaviors before and after financial incentives were implemented. Fifteen treatment employers introduced financial incentives into their wellness programs over 3 years, providing variation in the start dates, whereas 24 employers did not introduce financial incentives.

Effect of market competition on hospital performance for heart failure.

Objectives: To investigate whether market competition is a potential driver of hospital performance on the key evidence-based Joint Commission heart-failure (HF) quality indicators of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor/angiotensin receptor blocker prescribed, left ventricular function assessment, smoking-cessation counseling, and discharge instructions.

Study Design: Retrospective multivariate analysis.

Methods: Hospital performance data for HF was obtained from The Joint Commission's ORYX program from 2003 to 2006.

Health literacy and health care spending and utilization in a consumer-driven health plan.

We examined health literacy and health care spending and utilization by linking responses of three health literacy questions to 2006 claims data of enrollees new to consumer-driven health plans (n = 4,130). Better health literacy on all four health literacy measures (three item responses and their sum) was associated with lower total health care spending, specifically, lower emergency department and inpatient admission spending (p < .05).

Cost-effectiveness of enhancing primary care depression management on an ongoing basis.

Purpose: Although potentially costly, enhancing primary care depression management on an ongoing basis results in substantial long-term treatment effectiveness. The purpose of this article is to compare the cost-effectiveness of this approach with that of usual care.

Methods: The study was conducted in 12 community primary care practices randomized to enhanced or usual care after stratification by baseline practice patterns.