Medical Cost Alerts
Health Insurance Price Data: It’s Out There, but It’s Not for the Faint of Heart
Article Summary: Insurers have released information on the cost of services to comply with the price transparency rule, although leaving consumers with huge data that is quite incomprehensible. By Julie Appleby, KHN, July 27, 2022…. Read More
Study Claims Hospitals Charge Double for Specialty Drugs Compared to Pharmacies
Article Summary: A new study conducted by AHIP shows hospitals and doctors’ offices charge patients more for specialty drugs compared to specialty pharmacies. By Robert King, Fierce Healthcare, Feb 17, 2022. Hospitals on average charge… Read More
A hospital hiked the price of a routine childbirth by calling it an ’emergency’
Article Summary: A hospital inflated bills for healthy births by labelling them emergencies. By Rae Ellen Bichell, NPR, Oct 27, 2021. As a conservation biologist, Caitlin Wells Salerno knows that some mammals — like the… Read More
137 million Americans suffered hardships from medical costs: American Cancer Society
By Justin Doom, ABC News, May 3, 2019. More than 137 million U.S. adults, about 56%, have suffered because of costs tied to medical care, according to a study released Thursday by the American Cancer… Read More
Jaw Surgery Takes a $27,119 Bite out of One Man’s Budget
Article Summary: A Seattle patient discovers the hard way that you can still hit a lifetime limit for certain types of care. And health plans can vary a lot from one job to the next,… Read More
Hospital-employed physicians more likely to order unneeded MRIs, study finds
Article Summary: Study findings indicate that the odds of a patient receiving an inappropriate MRI referral increased by more than 20 percent after a physician transitioned to hospital employment. By Kelly Gooch, Becker’s Hospital Review,… Read More
Enough to Wreck Their Rest: $10,322 for a Sleep Study
Article Summary: The University of Miami Health System charged truck driver José Mendoza six times what Medicare would pay for an overnight test. He got trapped by his high-deductible health plan and sky-high billing. By… Read More
Hospitals and Insurers Didn’t Want You to See These Prices. Here’s Why.
By Sarah Kliff and Josh Katz. The New York Times, Aug. 22, 2021. This year, the federal government ordered hospitals to begin publishing a prized secret: a complete list of the prices they negotiate with… Read More
Free-standing ERs Charging Patients 10X More Than an Urgent Care Center or Doctor’s Office
By Phil Galewitz, Kaiser Health News, May 21, 2021. Colorado health officials so abhor the high costs associated with free-standing emergency rooms they’re offering to pay hospitals to shut the facilities down. The state wants… Read More