3 ms·
*Disclaimer: I'm not attempting to support HCA's billing practices here." HCA has profit margins around 10%, which do not appear to me to be exorbitant. (https
by mikekij 8y ago
*Disclaimer: I'm not attempting to support HCA's billing practices here."
HCA has profit margins around 10%, which do not appear to me to be exorbitant. (https://investor.hcahealthcare.com/press-release/hca-reports-first-quarter-2018-results https://investor.hcahealthcare.com/press-release/hca-reports...) While this patient's experience is clearly out of whack, and the $19k for a $1,500 stent thing is nuts, this points to a larger pricing / business model issue within US Healthcare. Typically, a few medical specialties (Surgery, Imaging, Rad Onc) have high profit margins, but are offset by losses in other departments (ER).
- krupan 8y agoThank you for pointing this out. How many medicaid patients paying below cost does it take to drag down profits from the occasional 1000% markup that the hospital gets away with?
- mikekij 8y agoCan't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, but yes, there are patients that pay (or are charged) a 1,000% markup, that in turn offsets patients not paying anything. I'm not saying the problem is the patients paying nothing; the problem is that the payment model is broken.
- krupan 8y agoI think you just said what I was trying to say. Thanks!