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I have a friend who is finishing up medical school as a radiologist. The way he explained it is that the rates doctors charge for a given procedure are largely
by pmorici 13y ago
I have a friend who is finishing up medical school as a radiologist. The way he explained it is that the rates doctors charge for a given procedure are largely dictated by the government Medicare and Medicaid programs since they are the largest "customers" of healthcare services. Every year or so there is an advisory body of doctors that is part of the AMA in each specialty that gets together and makes recommendations that then get approved by the government. The government pretty much rubber stamps what ever they say. So essentially the AMA is a doctors union that dictates prices.
http://swampland.time.com/2013/07/29/the-secretive-group-behind-medicare-reimbursements/ http://swampland.time.com/2013/07/29/the-secretive-group-beh...
- dragonwriter 13y ago> I have a friend who is finishing up medical school as a radiologist. The way he explained it is that the rates doctors charge for a given procedure are largely dictated by the government Medicare and Medicaid programs since they are the largest "customers" of healthcare services. Every year or so there is an advisory body of doctors that is part of the AMA in each specialty that gets together and makes recommendations that then get approved by the government. Actually, its just Medicare (the confusion may be because the governing entity is the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, but Medicaid is a state-federal partnership program where reimbursement is generally driven by state policy; the committee at issue [1] is related to Medicare specifically.) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specialty_Society_Relative_Value_Scale_Update_Committee http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specialty_Society_Relative_Valu...