So you need surgery? Good luck figuring out exactly what the procedure will cost you.
Not a single one of the eight California hospitals, including Stanford Hospital and UCSF Helen Diller Medical Center at Parnassus Heights, analyzed in a new report by the nonprofit Patient Rights Advocate (PRA) comply with a price transparency rule that requires medical centers to post standard charges and other information online so that patients can more easily figure out the cost of their health care upfront.
The report found that just 5.6% of 500 hospitals across the country comply fully with the rule, which took effect in January.
“These findings align with previous research indicating that hospitals are undermining the rule with incomplete information, burdensome access restrictions, code to block prices from being displayed on search engines, and tools to obfuscate access to mobile app developers and to patients,” the authors wrote.
Most of the hospitals studied comply with parts of the rule, but many do not post or only partially disclose the negotiated prices associated with all of the plans and payers they accept. They also often fail to publish a full list of discounted cash prices for people who pay without going through an insurance company.
To compile the report, the nonprofit reviewed a random sample of 500 hospital websites between May and July, with findings reviewed by a health care price data company called FireLight Health LLC.
According to the report, Stanford and UCSF have price estimate tools that provide cash prices, but the hospitals do not post a complete standard charge file or a required list of 300 common shoppable services covering everything from the cost of blood tests and X-rays to biopsies and cesarean sections, among other items.
In a statement, UCSF said it “is committed to helping patients and their families make informed decisions about every aspect of their care, including the costs associated with the care they seek.”
UCSF said estimates for the 300 shoppable services are included in its price estimator tool, but said the requirement that hospitals post standard charges for various procedures and treatments is “challenging” because few of its contracts include set prices. Instead, the cost for a particular service varies depending on what other services are provided.
The health center said it encourages patients with questions about potential charges to contact UCSF for personalized estimates.
Stanford said in a statement, “Stanford Health Care recognizes the importance of price transparency for our patients. An updated list of standard charges is available on Stanford Health Care’s website, as well as a list of standard charges in a machine-readable format and a link to our patient cost-estimator tool.”
In the report, PRA calls for stricter penalties, which are now $300 per hospital per day, for noncompliance, requiring actual prices instead of just estimates and other reforms.
The report comes days after the Biden Administration unveiled an executive order aimed at promoting competition in the American economy, which calls on the Department of Health and Human Services, led by former California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, to “support existing hospital price transparency rules and to finish implementing bipartisan federal legislation to address surprise hospital billing.”
A new study published in JAMA Tuesday found that unpaid medical bills became the largest source of debt that Americans owe collections agencies between 2009 and 2020, with the agencies holding a whopping $140 billion in unpaid medical bills last year alone.
