Despite Biden’s Healthcare Push, Hospital Chains Fall Short Of Transparency Requirement

In 2018, hospitals were required to make their healthcare prices public. However, in 2019 it looks like some of the nation’s largest hospital chains have not been as forthcoming about what their prices are.

Health Care Costs and Transparency

Hospitals have long been known for their unwillingness to share pricing information with the public. However, this reputation may be tarnished by the fact that many hospital chains have not yet complied with a transparency requirement set forth by the Obama administration.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires hospitals to publicly report the amount of money they spend on medical care for each type of treatment, provider, and geographic area. Hospitals have until January 15th of 2020 to comply with this rule.

Healthcare Availability

In a recent speech, Vice President Joe Biden called for greater transparency in healthcare pricing and said that hospitals should be open about their charges. However, many hospital chains are falling short of this transparency requirement.

According to The New York Times, some hospital chains are refusing to disclose the fees they charge for specific procedures or services. This lack of transparency can lead to confusion and frustration for patients who are trying to understand the cost of their care.

Biden is right to call for greater transparency in healthcare pricing. Patients deserve to know exactly what they are paying for their care, and hospitals should be open about their charges. If hospitals continue to fall short of this transparency requirement, Biden may be able to pressure them into changing their policies.

Healthcare Price Transparency

The Trump administration’s push for healthcare price transparency has produced mixed results. Some hospitals have voluntarily published prices of procedures and services, while others have not. Medicare has also made price transparency a requirement for all hospital marketing materials.

One reason hospital chains have been slow to comply is that disclosure of prices can be damaging to their business model. The American Hospital Association (AHA) estimates that hospitals lose an estimated $2 billion each year due to price transparency measures.

Nevertheless, some hospitals are making strides in pricing transparency. In January 2019, Stony Brook University Hospital in New York became the first academic medical center in the country to publish its median list price for hospital stays. A recent study published in Health Affairs found that median list prices at academic medical centers were 42% lower than the list prices at non-academic hospitals nationwide.

Hospitals should continue to try to comply with pricing transparency requirements, but they should also be aware of the risks involved. If pricing information is released improperly, it could lead to public scrutiny and true In 2010, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) became operational and required public reporting of prices for inpatient hospital services for Medicare beneficiaries. The price transparency provisions of the ACA are not comprehensive; however, hospitals can voluntarily report their list-price prices. Hospitals have been reluctant to do so because they fear that information will be misused. Hospitals have another reason to be concerned about the use of list prices: many hospital charges for services are not posted. Hospitals may also doubt their ability to comply with price transparency requirements because prospective purchasers include insurers, employers and government agencies, as well as private payers who will influence pricing decisions at different levels within a healthcare system.
To address these concerns, federal law exempts hospitals from __ adhering to the requirement of price transparency. Under an exception, hospitals are allowed to obtain discounts from providers in exchange for not posting their charges. The federal Department of Health and Human Services has proposed changes that would further complicate the implementation of price transparency initiatives. It is important that hospitals understand these proposed regulations and continue to advocate for policies that will facilitate price transparency while protecting patients’ rights.

Health Insurance Exchange

Many states have established health insurance exchanges (also called marketplaces) in which applicants can both compare plans and purchase coverage. The goal of a health insurance exchange is to make it easier for individuals to compare available options and purchase coverage with minimum hassle, confusion or cost—which would reduce the number of uninsured individuals or ills that are associated with lack of coverage. The federally facilitated marketplace—a state-based exchange—was created in part to make it easier for individuals to purchase coverage, including those who currently buy in the individual market directly from insurers. States have the option of operating their own exchanges or using the federal platform.States that have a federally facilitated exchange include New York, California and Kentucky, while states developing their own exchanges will be known as “healthcare.gov” states. To date, there are 15 healthcare.gov states (including Washington state), 18 working toward establishing an exchange, and 13 that have no plans to set up an exchange at this time (although some may revisit this decision depending on changes in federal regulations).In addition to true ers, the CBO also reports that about 4.4 million people who are currently uninsured will be covered through the exchange in 2014, but a significant number of those new enrollees will have to pay at least some out-of-pocket costs (23 percent on average) until 2016. Moreover, the majority of exchange enrollees who are self-employed or receive part of their income from investments and other sources will pay more than 8 percent of their income annually for health insurance in 2014.The CBO assumes that approximately 1 million additional people will gain coverage under the expansion over time, but it doesn’t provide a specific estimate on how many additional insured individuals would result from this provision. The agency instead estimates that improving access to care among the newly insured — through an estimated 30 percent reduction in the rate of uninsurance after 2016 — will reduce the number of uninsured by about 2 million in 2016, and that the resulting reductions in uncompensated care costs will pay for almost two-thirds of the cost of expanding coverage by 2017.

Biggest Hospital Chains Not Complying With New Rules

Despite Vice President Joe Biden’s push for transparency in healthcare, some of the biggest hospital chains in the country are not complying with new rules requiring them to release information on their prices, salaries and quality of care. The Obama administration announced the rule changes in January to increase transparency and accountability in the healthcare system. The new regulations require hospitals to disclose information on their costs, charges, income and patients’ outcomes. Hospitals that do not comply with the rules could face fines from the government.

Hospital chains that have failed to comply with the new regulations include HCA Holdings Inc., Tenet Healthcare Corp., Community Health Systems Inc., Catholic Healthcare West Inc., and MedStar Health Partners Inc. These companies have either refused to provide information on their costs or charged excessive fees for disclosure. In some cases, hospitals have even withheld information on patient outcomes or refused to release data on specific diseases or procedures.

Hospitals argue that releasing this information would be too expensive and would hamper their competitive edge. They also contend that releasing this data would violate the privacy of patients. However, advocates for increased transparency in healthcare say that releasing this information is important in order to assess whether patients are getting good value for their money and  get a better sense of what is going on in the health care system. Here, we provide information on the most common types of research that can be requested from hospitals by interested parties.  Data sets and sample size: As with other types of research, data sets are often too large to be analyzed quickly. For example, a study might have one thousand patients or more in a given time period. However, researchers who do not have access to this type of data may still need to conduct smaller analyses in order to confirm their findings. For example, if a researcher wants to find out whether certain hospital administrators are more likely than others to admit patients for particular procedures or receive bonuses for meeting certain criteria, they may want to compare a sample of hospital administrators with a control group. For example, these researchers might have data on the percentage of patients admitted, as well as on the percent of all Medicare beneficiaries (patients who received a bonus) that were admitted for these various procedures. In this study, using slightly more sophisticated statistical techniques than those discussed above and which, the researchers can compute several statistics about their data to determine whether their results are valid.

Summary

Despite Biden’s healthcare push, hospital chains fall short of transparency requirement.
On Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released a final rule requiring hospitals to disclose detailed information about their ownership and financial relationships with healthcare providers. The rule is part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which was enacted in 2010.

The final rule requires disclosure of ownership and financial relationships between hospitals and healthcare providers that receive more than $10 million in revenue from Medicare or Medicaid patients during the previous year. The rule also requires disclosure of any arrangements between a hospital and an entity that is not a healthcare provider but has contracts with the hospital to provide goods or services related to healthcare.

The final rule does not apply to emergency rooms, which are exempted from most federal transparency requirements. However, HHS is currently soliciting public comments on a proposed rule that would extend the transparency requirement to emergency rooms.

Many hospital chains have voiced concern about the impact of the transparency requirement on their business model. In particular, they have argued that disclosing ownership information will enable competitors to identify and disrupt customer relationships. Additionally, some hospital chains have said that they will be unable to comply with the transparency