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Feb
07

Kaiser Health News: Women Shouldn’t Get A Bill For An IUD … But Sometimes They Do

HCCI data was recently cited in a Kaiser Health News story on IUD billing.  From the article:  "In all likelihood, most women probably won't get a bill for IUD insertion or a birth control prescription. Data compiled by the Health Care Cost Institute, an independent research group funded by insurers, suggested that in 2017 fewer than 5% of women had an out-of-pocket bill for the insertio...

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Jan
30

The Washington Post: The Health 202: Health-care costs might decline if hospitals are forced by the Trump administration to disclose their prices

HCCI research on the potential effects of price transparency on price variation was cited in a recent Washington Post article. "There is more wiggle room on the high side — it could make up for price increases on the lower side," said Kevin Kennedy, one of the study researchers. The Health 202: Health-care costs might decline if hospitals are forced by the Trump administration to disclose the...

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Jan
29

HCCI Provides Comments for CMS's Proposed Transparency in Coverage Rule

On November 27, 2019 CMS proposed a rule (CMS-9915-P) requiring group health plans and health insurance issuers in the individual and group markets to disclose cost-sharing information to enrollees, including an estimates of an enrollee's cost-sharing liability for covered items or services furnished by a particular provider. As also noted in our comments on rule CMS-1717-P, HC...

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Jan
29

What if Price Transparency Reduced Commercial Price Variation?

As previous reports have indicated, there is widespread price variation in the U.S. commercial health care system. Many studies have shown that prices are dramatically different not only across geographies, but they vary substantially even within the same market for the same service. For example, we found that prices for the same blood tests could vary 39-fold within Tampa, Florida and the cost of...

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Jan
16

CMS-specified shoppable services accounted for 12% of 2017 health care spending among individuals with employer-sponsored insurance

% Total Medical Spending % Out-of-Pocket Medical Spending % Medical Charges% Medical  Utilization All Medical Care 11.8 15.6 12.317.2Inpatient Care7.95.68.04.8Outpatient Care13.116.513.717.2 In response to high and growing health care spending, policymakers have proposed improving price transparency as a solution. Several such proposals rely on consumers taking action on publicly av...

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