Trends in the financialisation of outpatient care across OECD countries: What do we know?

This paper summarises the findings of research into the financialisation of outpatient care across OECD countries. It finds that outpatient specialised services have become a recent target of financial institutions active in the healthcare sector, notably across dentistry, ophthalmology, radiology, biology and primary care. While financialisation was reported to be a concern by a majority of responding countries, how financialisation is taking place also varies depending on how health systems are structured. Moreover, despite a growing evidence base around the potential – often negative – impacts of investments by some financial actors, notably private equity firms, countries lack a cohesive picture of the extent to which financial firms have scaled-up investments into their health systems. The paper further presents a set of policy considerations to address financialisation in outpatient care.