Availability of Consumer Prices From US Hospitals for a Common Surgical Procedure

Rosenthal, Jaime; Lü, Xin; Cram, Peter

doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2013.460

Cited by 97 publications

(85 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…In the primary care literature, similar correlations have been documented linking low Medicaid-to-Medicare fee ratios with decreased access to care for patients with Medicaid 19 . It has been previously shown that among hospitals, a wide variation in price exists for elective orthopaedic surgical procedures 20 . It has also been well documented that the total cost for common orthopaedic services is significantly higher in the United States, compared with countries with single-payer systems 21 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Regional Assessment of Medicaid Access to Outpatient Orthopaedic Care: The Influence of Population Density and Proximity to Academic Medical Centers on Patient Access

Patterson

Draeger²,

Olsson³

et al. 2014

The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Regional Assessment of Medicaid Access to Outpatient Orthopaedic Care: The Influence of Population Density and Proximity to Academic Medical Centers on Patient Access

Patterson

Draeger²,

Olsson³

et al. 2014

The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery

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“…The price of health care services can vary dramatically (Cooper, Craig, Gaynor, and Van Reenen 2015) and providers often cannot tell patients what the price will be in advance (Rosenthal, Lu, and Cram 2013). People also often have distorted perceptions of risk in the context of insurance, sometimes ignoring the possibility of low-probability events altogether and sometimes overreacting to certain salient risks (for example, Johnson, Hershey, Meszaros, and Kunreuther 1993).…”

Section: Evidence On Consumer Confusion In Health Insurance Choicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Questionable Value of Having a Choice of Levels of Health Insurance Coverage

Ericson

Sydnor

2017

Journal of Economic Perspectives

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In most health insurance markets in the United States, consumers have substantial choice about their health insurance plan. However additional choice is not an unmixed blessing as it creates challenges related to both consumer confusion and adverse selection. There is mounting evidence that many people have difficulty understanding the value of insurance coverage, like evaluating the relative benefits of lower premiums versus lower deductibles. Also, in most US health insurance markets, people cannot be charged different prices for insurance based on their individual level of health risk. This creates the potential for well-known problems of adverse selection because people will often base the level of health insurance coverage they choose partly on their health status. In this essay, we examine how the forces of consumer confusion and adverse selection interact with each other and with market institutions to affect how valuable it is to have multiple levels of health insurance coverage available in the market.

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“…Despite the large amount of dispersion, prices negotiated between insurers and providers are generally not publicly known (Stockwell Farrell et al 2010; United States Government Accountability Office 2011; Painter and Chernew 2012;Rosenthal, Lu, and Cram 2013). Only very recently have firms and insurers begun to provide consumers access to prices.…”

Section: Prices and Price Information In Health Carementioning

confidence: 99%

Does It Pay to Know Prices in Health Care?

Lieber

2017

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy

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H ealth care spending accounts for 18 percent of the United States economy and has grown faster than GDP in 42 of the past 50 years. As a result, containing health care costs has become a primary concern of public policy as well as the private sector. Unlike most markets, consumers know very little about prices in health care. Research in other markets has found that increasing price transparency reduces prices (e.g., Brown and Goolsbee 2002; Goldmanis et al. 2010), but it is not clear the same will be true in health care: health insurance insulates patients from prices, reducing the benefits of switching to a lower priced provider.In this paper, I estimate whether access to and use of price information affects the prices paid for medical care. I use a unique dataset in which the employees of a large firm gain access to price information provided by Compass Professional Health Services (Compass hereafter). The novel feature of the data is a direct measure of search: Compass tracks the use of its price information and so directly measures search.I begin by estimating how access to price information affects the prices paid for care. A subset of the employees were given access to price information in a pilot program to determine whether it was worth purchasing for all of the employees. The employees who gained access early did not sign up, volunteer, or select into the pilot program in any way; they were given access early because they worked for the company's corporate offices. I estimate a differences-in-differences model that takes advantage of this variation in access both across groups and over time. The results suggest that access to price information reduces the average price paid by

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Availability of Consumer Prices From US Hospitals for a Common Surgical Procedure

Cited by 97 publications

References 17 publications

A Regional Assessment of Medicaid Access to Outpatient Orthopaedic Care: The Influence of Population Density and Proximity to Academic Medical Centers on Patient Access

A Regional Assessment of Medicaid Access to Outpatient Orthopaedic Care: The Influence of Population Density and Proximity to Academic Medical Centers on Patient Access

The Questionable Value of Having a Choice of Levels of Health Insurance Coverage

Does It Pay to Know Prices in Health Care?

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