Episode 110: Rooting Out Bad Actors in Private Equity, With Lauren Makhoul
Aug 18, 2025
Lauren Makhoul dives into the complex world of private equity in healthcare, urging a nuanced approach to identifying bad actors. She highlights how loopholes allow exploitative practices to thrive across all providers, not just those backed by private equity. The discussion touches on the inadequacies of current regulations, advocating for systemic reforms that address underlying issues. Makhoul emphasizes that while private equity faces scrutiny, provider-owned businesses often operate with less oversight, complicating the narrative surrounding healthcare investments.
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insights INSIGHT
Focus On Root Causes Not Actors
Targeting investor type misses the root problem of exploitable loopholes in healthcare payment and billing.
Policy should address the mechanisms that enable bad behavior rather than ban particular actors.
question_answer ANECDOTE
Provider-Owned Firms Can Be Worse
Geoff recounts that some of the worst bad-actor cases he has seen were provider-owned, not private equity-backed.
He observes private equity platforms often face heavier scrutiny and thus act more cautiously.
insights INSIGHT
Two Paths To Higher Revenue
Revenue can rise via higher utilization or higher unit prices, and both drive incentives for bad conduct.
Consolidation that boosts negotiating leverage can have legitimate benefits as well as risks.
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Lauren Makhoul of Avalere Health returns for the second installment of The Corner Series Shorts to discuss rooting out bad actors in private equity. In this conversation with McGuireWoods partner and host Geoff Cockrell, Lauren advocates for a “nuanced perspective” that addresses the loopholes allowing bad actors to exist. She explains how mechanisms such as single TIN-billing exploitation affect all healthcare providers, not just private equity-backed platforms, and why site-neutral payment policies could address underlying issues more effectively.
Tune in for her insights about how private equity-backed platforms often face heightened scrutiny while provider-owned businesses may engage in similar practices with less oversight.
A spinoff of The Corner Series, The Corner SeriesShorts delivers quick, high-impact insights from dealmakers and thought leaders at the corner of healthcare and private equity. Each short episode — less than 10 minutes — offers a focused look at key trends, timely topics and expert perspectives.
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