Pharmacotherapy for Children and Adolescents With Overweight or Obesity: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.

Hospital mergers have proliferated across the United States (U.S.) since the 1980s and are projected to continue apace. Policy changes such as the revocation of the 2021 executive order and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) increasing the transaction thresholds (i.e., purchase price) necessary for pre-merger notification filings, make it easier for hospitals to merge. However, the implications of mergers for quality-of-care in general and nursing quality in particular remain difficult to anticipate. On the one hand, standards-setting organizations and payers like the National Quality Forum, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and the Joint Commission now track patient safety and quality-of-care metrics that are strongly impacted by nursing, tying accreditation and financial incentives to hospital performance. But other healthcare system shocks, like the COVID pandemic, have moved long-standing concerns for nurse well-being to the forefront or policy discourse as the nursing workforce crisis grows. What is clear are the gaps in our current knowledge about the impact of mergers. The FTC and the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced a Request For Information in 2023, for empirical evidence on the impact of hospital mergers on market competition, employees, and patient care to inform regulatory decisions. Identifying what is currently known about hospital mergers for nursing staff and nursing-related quality is essential for evidence-based policy making.