Industry growing pains
August 17, 2014
A number of signs point to increasing transparency within the realm of US health care, especially in terms of pricing. As the cost of health care continues to increase above the rate of inflation, employers have been shifting costs onto their employees -- via less subsidy for premiums, higher co-pays, higher co-insurance, and/or higher deductibles. As employees realize that their decisions have serious financial consequences, they will become more informed and engaged. As they continue to ask for pricing information, such information will (eventually) become more available. The journey, however, isn't always smooth. Modern Healthcare published an article about how doctors are finding that an increasing portion of their time with patients is spent discussing financial matters, and that patients will sometimes push for less effective tests or treatments in order to save money.
This is an indication that financial considerations are becoming more important to the patients (who, up until relatively recently, could often rely on their insurance companies to cover most of the bill). With doctors starting to complain about figuring out costs, maybe more insurance companies will move faster in unveiling easy-to-use cost calculators.