How the Current Healthcare Climate is Affecting Mergers and Acquisitions

As Seen in “Paul Martin’s Crucial Conversations”

In the last 12 months, USPh has been fortunate enough to add close to 60 locations. The struggles businesses are experiencing today, including reimbursement, interest rates, and regulatory environments could be with us for a while. It continuously gets harder to run an outpatient physical therapy business, which makes finding a good partner so that you can execute what you want to do.

Read Below for Highlights from Chris Reading’s Interview on Mergers and Acquisitions

What does USPh look for in a business?

Knowing your business and caring about your team is important. On the quantitative side, we look for someone who knows how to run a good strong business. On the qualitative side – we look for business owners with integrity, communication, and vision. People who see opportunity even in the difficulty. Companies don’t have to be perfect for us to be interested. We look at opportunities to help make things better.

Is there anything unique that USPh looks for in today’s market?

More than anything right now, we try to assess somebody’s grit and their ability to be resilient. We’d rather look at a 5-10 clinic group that had someone with the courage to close a facility and get to the other side of that. There is grit getting through COVID, staffing facilities/front desks, all while continuing to focus on the right things. We’re looking for someone with the ability to continue forward and focus on getting through rough patches.

Does technology use affect decisions?

Right now no, not yet. We really want open-mindedness. One of the traits I look for is people who are willing to say – this is how we used to do it, but we’re willing to try something new.

Any advice for businesses entering the acquisition market?

Look at your business objectively. Look at your volume – net rate – how you’re staffed. We’re not suggesting massive changes, but be aware of where you are.

One of the things we run into that can make a big difference in whether or not we move forward is not being prepared on the compliance side. We don’t look for perfection, but awareness, intent, and if they’ve invested resources to try and get that part right. That gives us confidence that we’ll be able to get them to the other side.