re: Trump to force Hospitals to disclose their prices

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Well, for example if one hospital runs a series of Family Medicine Clinics predominantly using MDs while the another hospital system employs Nurse Practitioners or rotating providers for the same or higher charge, a patient might want to know that in advance. Especially if there is copay exposure.

If one facility outsources path or lab results to an uncovered provider while another does not, charge differentials could be significant. Patients should be apprised of that cost in advance.

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I support transparency. It's certainly better than the alternative. It's just that the complexity of interaction between patient, doctor, and insurance means that full disclosure is going to have limited effect.

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But a significant benefit would arise in the fact most hospitals are run so inefficiently that the individuals who are actually generating charges have no clue as to what is expensive and what is not. Ask a surgeon the cost differential between two fairly interchangeable sutures --- often he'll have no clue. Ask an RN cost differential between two IV cannulas -- same thing, no clue. Ask an administrator the cost of not having enough clean up crews for an OR, they might well respond "the fewer the better". . . . ie not a clue. Nor in many (most) cases do facilities have good insight into innumerable cost sinks. Much of that would become apparent and therefore addressable with price transparency.

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I'm not really sure what you're getting at here. This EO is about disclosure to the public. Maybe physicians don't understand the costs, but their employers can certainly divulge that data. Nothing is changing in that scenario.