Private Equity Healthcare Acquisitions – May 2026

In light of continued investor interest in healthcare and therisks associated with private equity ownership of healthcare companies, the Private Equity Stakeholder Project is tracking private equity-backed healthcare acquisitions. Below is a list of private equity healthcare buyouts, growth investments, and add-on acquisitions completed during May 2026. We will continue to track acquisitions on a monthly basis.

See April 2026 acquisitions here.

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In May we tracked 18 buyouts, 33 add-on acquisitions, and 30 growth/expansion investments.

Private equity firms made four acquisitions in the medical staffing sector in May

In February 2026, Capstone Partners, an investment banking firm, published a report on mergers and acquisitions activity in the healthcare staffing market, indicating that “hospitals and healthcare facilities will likely continue to rely heavily upon third-party staffing agencies to deliver quality patient care, supporting continued consolidation within the Healthcare Staffing market.” The report identifies staffing shortages as a reason for increased activity in the sector, and cites a Hallmark Health Care Solutions survey that found “a staggering 94% of healthcare organizations have relied upon per diem positions and contract work as core components of their staffing models, with 49% expecting a 50% or greater increase in contingent labor roles in 2026.”

One way medical systems address nursing staffing shortages is through travel nurses. PESP published a report in October 2022 on private equity’s investments in the medical staffing industry, particularly travel nursing which increased during the pandemic. The report highlighted nursing shortages, the unprecedented rate hikes for travel nurses and the associated skyrocketing labor costs faced by hospitals, and the opportunistic influx of private equity into the medical staffing industry during a health crisis. It also called attention to how the under-regulated, for-profit health system in the United States has substantial vulnerabilities.

The report found that, as a fragmented industry with considerable opportunities for consolidation, the medical staffing sector has been attractive to private equity. Further, an aging population and long-term projected shortage of nurses to meet the needs of this population has also attracted investors. The returns private equity firms make from their investments in travel nursing are ultimately derived from the pockets of patients, payers (e.g. insurance companies), and taxpayers who pay for and subsidize the cost of healthcare.

Cross Country Healthcare entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by private equity firm Knox Lane for $437 million

Cross Country Healthcare provides healthcare staffing services as well as technology to help manage workforces. Cross Country announced an agreement to be purchased by Aya for $615 million in late 2024, but the deal fell apart in December 2025 following “significant competitive concerns” from the Federal Trade Commission regarding the deal, which would have combined two of the nation’s largest healthcare staffing companies. In May, private equity firm Knox Lane announced that it had entered into a definitive agreement to purchase Cross Country Healthcare for $437 million in a take-private deal. In covering the deal, Healthcare Divenoted that the agreement comes after Cross Country reported a revenue of $241.1 million in its first quarter results for 2026, down 18% year over year, and a net loss of $4.3 million, compared with a loss of $500,000 during the last quarter.

Private equity acquired three revenue cycle management companies

Revenue cycle management (RCM) includes identifying, managing, and collecting medical claims and patient payments. PESP published a report on RCM companies and medical debt in September 2024 titled Private Equity’s Revenue Cycle: Creating and Collecting U.S. Medical Debt. Some of the key findings of that report included:

• Private equity firms have consolidated debt collectors, medical payments, and other revenue cycle management functions into “end-to-end” service providers, coordinated from the point of initial patient contact to aggressive follow-up on payments for services;
• Some private equity-owned debt collectors have suggested that they are more aggressive than other debt collection companies; and
• Private equity-owned revenue cycle management companies have increasingly helped facilitate loans – through medical credit cards, installment plans, and strategic partnerships with financial service providers – to indebt patients who cannot afford to pay a full medical bill at one time.

We tracked the following acquisitions of RCM companies in May:

• Incline Equity Partners acquired Community Link Consulting via its platform company, VMG Health.
• The Carlyle Group acquired EqualizeRCM and Knack RCM to create a global multi-specialty healthcare RCM platform

In its announcement about the transaction, Carlyle describes the two companies it acquired as “complementary healthcare RCM providers” serving multiple physician specialties and durable medical equipment providers. The announcement concludes, “Carlyle intends to build on this platform strategy by pursuing additional opportunities in the RCM industry and will continue to seek to add synergistic assets with complementary offerings to the RCM platform.”