The study, published Jan. 30 in the Journal of the American College of Radiology, analyzed data from CB Insights and Pitchbook using radiology-related keywords. Researchers filtered transactions to those related to private equity, including venture capital and publicly traded entities. They removed businesses in veterinary medicine, picture archiving and communications system providers, radiopharma firms and those in imaging equipment repair.
“For radiologists, their productivity, income, and job satisfaction may all be affected by these acquisitions,” the authors said. “For patients, their ability to access medical imaging and the quality and affordability of their radiologic care may be compromised.”
Here are eight statistics:
1. The region with the most active transactions was the South with 50 deals. Of those 18 were in Texas and 15 in Florida.
2. The busiest year for corporate dealmaking in diagnostic imaging was 2021 with roughly 18 deals.
3. Transaction activity appeared to peak in 2021 and activity decreased in 2024, possibly due to macroeconomic conditions such as increased costs of capital, effects from the No Surprises Act or adversarial regulatory environment, the study authors said.
4. Corporate entities were most likely to acquire practices that employed between 50 to 99 radiologists.
