State lawmakers moved aggressively in 2025 to reshape the healthcare marketplace, enacting a wave of legislation aimed at tightening oversight of consolidation, limiting noncompete agreements, curbing private equity influence and revising certificate-of-need laws.
Here are 37 enacted bills related to consolidation and competition, based on data from the National Conference of State Legislatures:
Arkansas
- H 1653: Updates licensing rules for psychiatric residential treatment facilities and allows exceptions to bed-capacity moratoriums.
- S 139: Limits enforceability of noncompete agreements for certain licensed medical professionals.
California
- S 351: Bars private equity and hedge funds from interfering in physicians’ and dentists’ clinical decision-making.
Colorado
- S 126: Requires state-level filing of federal merger notifications with the attorney general.
- S 83: Prohibits contracts that restrict providers from informing patients about care options or practice changes.
Connecticut
- H 7067: Revises emergency CON processes for hospital ownership transfers tied to bankruptcy.
District of Columbia
- B 25: Exempts certain telehealth and outpatient providers from CON requirements.
Illinois
- H 1431: Requires hospitals to disclose facility fees for outpatient services.
Indiana
- H 1666: Expands reporting and oversight of healthcare ownership and mergers.
- S 119: Allows attorney general review of certificate-of-public-advantage applications with state health officials.
- S 475: Restricts enforcement of physician noncompete agreements after employment ends.
Iowa
- H 887: Removes birth centers from CON requirements.
- H 919: Establishes licensing standards for nonprofit children’s specialty hospitals and exempts them from CON.
- H 933: Allows pediatric palliative care centers to offer hospice services without CON approval.
Kentucky
- H 305: Expands eligible healthcare credentials and removes certain EMS CON requirements.
- H 90: Establishes licensure and standards for freestanding birthing centers.
Maine
- H 1036: Creates a commission to review healthcare transaction oversight and CON laws.
- S 416: Imposes a moratorium on private equity and real estate trust ownership of hospitals.
Minnesota
- H 3: Requires advance notice and disclosures for nonprofit nursing home or assisted living facility sales to for-profit entities.
Montana
- H 620: Limits post-employment noncompete agreements for healthcare providers.
- S 88: Updates CON application and public notice processes.
New Hampshire
- S 172: Prohibits enforcement of certain contract restrictions on advanced practice registered nurses.
New Jersey
- S 4263: Orders a state study on inpatient commitment bed capacity and CON requirements.
New Mexico
- H 586: Expands oversight and enforcement authority under the state’s Healthcare Consolidation Oversight Act.
Oklahoma
- S 873: Revises University Hospitals statutes and creates CON exemptions.
Oregon
- S 951: Protects clinician autonomy and restricts noncompete and nondisclosure agreements affecting patient care.
Vermont
- H 96: Raises thresholds triggering CON review and updates project definitions.
Virginia
- H 1552: Expands exemptions from CON requirements.
- H 2119: Establishes an expedited CON application and review process.
- S 1064: Expands expedited CON review for bed changes and psychiatric facilities.
- S 1177: Further broadens CON exemptions for certain facility actions.
- S 1203: Creates expedited CON criteria for underserved or low-density areas.
- S 1218: Limits noncompete agreements and updates employment law provisions.
Washington
- H 1686: Creates a statewide registry of healthcare entity ownership and control.
- H 1755: Exempts certain elective cardiac procedures from CON requirements.
- S 5122: Aligns state antitrust premerger notification rules with federal requirements.
Wyoming
- S 107: Voids physician noncompete agreements after employment or affiliation ends.
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