Keeping up with the Joneses: The Influence of Public and Proprietary Neighbours on Voluntary Hospitals

Abstract

Individual hospitals often share their markets with other nearby hospitals. In this paper we examine how a hospital's ownership and the ownership of its hospital neighbours influence the availability of selected services. The presence of a CT scanner and a newborn nursery were found to be associated with both hospital ownership (voluntary, proprietary, or public) and with the ownership of hospital neighbours. Voluntary hospitals with a proprietary neighbour were more likely to have a CT scanner. These findings suggest that the ownership configuration of local hospital markets is an important influence on patterns of service availability.