The impact of hospital mergers on performance: new evidence from English NHS data

The objective of this paper is to examine whether hospital mergers have had a significant impact on hospital performance. To this end, we use data from the NHS Performance Ratings System, in place between 2000/2001 and 2004/2005, in which performance is measured through a broad set of ``balanced scorecard‘’ indicators covering clinical and patient outcomes as well as hospital capacity and capability and combined into a composite indicator. We find that mergers may potentially lead to a decline in hospital performance. Our results suggest that hospital mergers may not be the most effective strategy to improve hospital performance. Nevertheless, this study can be considered as an empirical evaluation of a policy intervention aimed at assessing the short-term effects of hospital mergers on the hospital performance.