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Removing any of the information asymmetry in health care is useful. Providers in clinics usually don't know what procedures costs, especially with various insu

by mey 9y ago

Removing any of the information asymmetry in health care is useful. Providers in clinics usually don't know what procedures costs, especially with various insurance negotiations. This empowers patients and additionally medical providers themselves. It is a real conversation (in non-emergent situations) that should be happening with patients and providers about what the patient can afford. If you do not like that this exposes publicly the capitalist nature of US health care, then I encourage you to support a universal/government health care option, rather than trying to prove this information isn't helpful.

snuxoll 9y ago
Honestly the biggest pain in the ass when it comes to trying to price healthcare comes outside office visits. Want to go in for a surgical procedure? You think it's going to cost $X but it ends up costing $X+Y because some complication caused the operation to run 10-15 minutes over the estimated time and now you have an extra unit of time for the anesthesiologist getting billed. Price transparency is great, but office visits are basically the only thing you can estimate well upfront (there's five CPT codes for the visit, 99211-99215 and it's easy to estimate which one will apply based on whether it's a new/existing patient and the level of history/examination you anticipate requiring). I will stand by my belief that the only way to "fix" healthcare in our country is going full single-payer so citizens don't have to worry about whether they can afford to get treated or not.
- arethuza 9y ago
  A few years back my son got his tonsils taken out at a private hospital in the UK (my employer at the time provided it) - after the operation the anesthesiologist and apologized and said that due to a billing mistake I'd have to pay an additional amount directly and handed me a bill. Having read horror stories about medical billing in the US I was prepared for a shock. However the bill was for something like £4.50... :-)

by mey 9y ago

snuxoll 9y ago

Honestly the biggest pain in the ass when it comes to trying to price healthcare comes outside office visits. Want to go in for a surgical procedure? You think it's going to cost $X but it ends up costing $X+Y because some complication caused the operation to run 10-15 minutes over the estimated time and now you have an extra unit of time for the anesthesiologist getting billed. Price transparency is great, but office visits are basically the only thing you can estimate well upfront (there's five CPT codes for the visit, 99211-99215 and it's easy to estimate which one will apply based on whether it's a new/existing patient and the level of history/examination you anticipate requiring). I will stand by my belief that the only way to "fix" healthcare in our country is going full single-payer so citizens don't have to worry about whether they can afford to get treated or not.

arethuza 9y ago
A few years back my son got his tonsils taken out at a private hospital in the UK (my employer at the time provided it) - after the operation the anesthesiologist and apologized and said that due to a billing mistake I'd have to pay an additional amount directly and handed me a bill. Having read horror stories about medical billing in the US I was prepared for a shock. However the bill was for something like £4.50... :-)