The share of healthcare outsourced by the NHS to independent providers has increased from 5% in 2009 to 7% in 2014, according to LaingBuisson's Healthcare Market Review.
The share of private paid healthcare as part of the overall healthcare market fell from 6% to 5% over the same period.
The largest market for the independent sector in health and social care was care homes for the older and physically disabled, with a market worth £14.3bn.
Private acute medical care was the second largest market worth £7.2bn while primary care dentistry was worth £5.8bn, although the figure includes dentists with NHS practices.
In social care the public sector outsourced share has increased to 63% in 2014 from 60% in 2009, while private paid social care rose from 28% of the market in 2009 to 29% in 2014.
The increase was driven by the older people's care home market which dominates the sector, the report said.
The total value of the services provided by the Independent sector was £44.3bn in 2014.
The definition of Independent providers in the report includes both for-profit companies and non-profit organisations.
The research was published in LaingBuisson's twenty-seventh edition of the LaingBuisson Healthcare Market Review.
LaingBuisson recently warned that the NHS needs internal competition as it faces a £30bn funding gap by 2020/21.
William Laing, CEO of LaingBuisson and author of the report said: "Having weathered the economic downturn, and established a more solid foothold in NHS outsourced healthcare, we are now on the cusp of a period of renewed opportunities for independent healthcare providers as the bounce in general economic health is slowly feeding through.
"Despite ongoing political arguments over the role of private providers in delivery of NHS services, and the high profile breakdown of the Circle/ Hinchingbrooke contract, prospects look reasonably positive given the broad direction of change towards pluralism in public healthcare markets, together with strengthening self-pay demand and a surge in overseas demand for UK based - primarily London - hospitals."
He added: "The value of elderly care provision is up in formal residential care and services delivered in peoples' own homes and with the number of 85 year olds set to quadruple by 2070 LaingBuisson projects that both capacity and demand will continue to grow for several decades."
