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By effectively putting strategy into action, hospitals and healthcare systems can thrive amid today’s financial and operational challenges and position themselves to confront the looming threats that are just around the corner.

The challenges that hospitals and health systems currently face are amplifying this complexity, from uncertainty about potential changes to federal healthcare policy—including Medicaid and NIH funding cuts and tariffs—inflation, and ongoing workforce challenges.

Hospitals continue to lose significant money on employing physicians, and the original goals of care coordination and efficiency haven't materialized. Rising costs, declining reimbursement advantages, overutilization of low-margin services and administrative burdens are factors behind these unsustainable losses.

The hospital and health system leaders we work with are extremely concerned about the financial impact their organizations may experience from potentially significant Medicaid policy changes, following the recent passage of a budget resolution by the U.S. House of Representatives.

A conversation with Rich Liekweg, CEO of BJC Health System in Missouri, and Nick Barto, president of BJC Health System

It has been an incredibly busy and exciting year for our Strategy & Business Transformation practice at Kaufman Hall. In 2024, we observed hospitals and health systems take steps to reinvigorate their strategic efforts amid a stabilizing, but still challenging, outlook.

In a roundtable discussion, Kaufman Hall Managing Directors Matthew Bates and Nora Kelly and Senior Vice President Max Timm discuss the rise of risk-based contracting in value-based healthcare arrangements, what providers and insurers need to watch out for, and what success in risk-based contracting will look like.

Healthcare is undergoing a major realignment as stakeholders compete for consumers’ attention. The different strategies intersect at the physician’s office, and physicians today face an unprecedented array of practice options.

For more than a decade, hospitals, payers, and other healthcare stakeholders have experimented with moving healthcare payment from fee-for-service, volume-based contracts to arrangements that reward providers for the value of the care they provide.

The aggressive growth plans of physician practice disruptors mean that competitive dynamics might change—and change quickly—in many local markets. Learn how independent physician groups and health systems can respond.