(But will reveal the the unacceptable and unjust absurdity of how we pay for medical services.)
Reporter Gilbert Corsey of WDRB was, to my knowledge, first on the block locally to take public look at the implementation of a newly enforced federal law requiring hospitals to publish their Standard Charges online. Originally part of the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacared) as turned into regulation last year,, the stated purpose was to allow the public to compare the cost of services and choose wisely among hospitals before they incur responsibility for payment. An overlying expectation (?dream) was to improve quality and decrease costs. Hospitals bitterly protested implementation of this law.
Mr. Corsey’s reporting verified the expectation that charges amoung neighboring hospitals can vary greatly. For example, an uncomplicated birth at one Louisville hospital was priced twice as high as another, and an injection of a drug used for prostatic cancer varied threefold. Corsey’s report also concluded that the published lists are confusing and difficult to decipher. I agree. I will go further and argue these lists are essentially worthless for their intended consumer purpose – surely knowingly so. Their value however for unintentionally making the policy point that, like pricing for pharmaceuticals, hospital pricing and billing exists in a logic-free, Alice-in Wonderland zone to the detriment of the public. Allow me to explain. Continue reading “Federally Mandated Postings of Standard Charges by Louisville Hospitals Are Unusable for Their Intended Purpose.”