GAO on Health Care Price Transparency

Posted on October 25, 2011 by novahockey

GAO is out with a report on the difficulty of making health care pricing transparent to consumers. I haven’t ready it yet, but I know this is of interest to several of you, so I’d thought I’d pass it along. I also know I’m way late on a MedPAC post, which I’m working on simultaneously with my client work.

GAO Report on Health Care Price Transparency

Filed under: Uncategorized |

« »

8 Responses

  1. Unknown's avatar
    Mark in Austin, on October 25, 2011 at 2:41 pm said:

    Thanks for the link!

    Like

    Reply
  2. Unknown's avatar
    kevinwillis.net, on October 25, 2011 at 2:43 pm said:

    I'm having a trouble with lack of transparency in healthcare costs right now, but I think it has more to do with the people I went to. I've gone to places where I've gotten a pretty clear idea of what my total costs would be. This place just kept piling on unexplained charges at $400 a pop.Solution? I'm never going there again. My wife went to a podiatrist that was a lot better at communicating about costs. Thus, that's where I'm going next time, even if it is a further drive.

    Like

    Reply
  3. Unknown's avatar
    lmsinca, on October 25, 2011 at 2:58 pm said:

    Thanks NoVAI'll read the link sometime today I hope. It really is an issue for a lot of us. I keep hearing the argument that we consume too much health care but consumers are basically unable to determine the cost of health care. The costs seem to be determined by the insurance industry for the most part. At least that's been my experience. And there seems to be two different cost structures for those with or without insurance.

    Like

    Reply
  4. Unknown's avatar
    ashotinthedark, on October 25, 2011 at 4:00 pm said:

    There seems to be lots of barriers to obtaining this sort of information and I'm skeptical that we can overcome all of them. Kevin- That's not a terrible solution, but I'm sure you would agree that it's at least one step too late.

    Like

    Reply
  5. Unknown's avatar
    kevinwillis.net, on October 25, 2011 at 4:17 pm said:

    Ashot: surely. I would like to see a reliable, transparent marketplace. It should be clear to the consumer if you're doing something that's going to cost me $400 in the insurance doesn't pay (which it won't, when the provider files wrong), you should mention that to me ahead of time.

    Like

    Reply
  6. Unknown's avatar
    jnc4p, on October 25, 2011 at 5:20 pm said:

    As always, the single best thing to be done in health care/insurance policy is to eliminate the employer tax exemption for employee health insurance benefits, or convert it to an individual tax exemption.

    Like

    Reply
  7. Unknown's avatar
    lmsinca, on October 25, 2011 at 5:36 pm said:

    Nobody making policy listens to us do they jnc? It's actually one of the things I've heard people on both sides of the political divide agree on.

    Like

    Reply
  8. Unknown's avatar
    lmsinca, on October 25, 2011 at 5:46 pm said:

    jncI have to tell you about my conversation with the Worker's Comp auditor who's coming out tomorrow. I've called three times since we got the notice a week ago with a couple of questions and she finally called back this morning. I asked her about one of the boxes checked off re Federal Tax forms and she didn't know what that meant, "It's just a form letter" was her comment so I guess I don't need to worry about that one. She said all she really needed was our payroll records and I said I could just fax them over, unfortunately she works out of her home and her fax isn't working. Then she said she needs the questionnaire filled out that was with the letter. There wasn't one…………OMG

    Like

    Reply

Leave a reply to lmsinca Cancel reply