Share of physicians working in private practice continues to fall: AMA

Dive Brief:

Inadequate payment rates, high resource costs and regulatory red tape are increasingly driving physicians away from work in private practice toward employment at hospitals or practices owned by private equity firms, according to a new analysis published by the American Medical Association.

Just over 42% of physicians worked in private practices in 2024, representing an 18 percentage point drop compared to 2012. Meanwhile, more than a third of the nation’s physicians worked in practices owned by hospitals last year, representing an 11 percentage point gain over the same period. Nearly 7% of doctors worked in firms owned by private equity, an increase compared to 2020.

Physicians are also less likely to have ownership stake in their practice, according to the analysis. The A