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Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

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Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#321

Post by AlphaSite »

refurb wrote: post #237
Barrin92 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

beyond Europe as well. Singapore which has exceptionally low healthcare spending (5.9% of GDP) heavily controls prices and purchases down to individual equipment in hospitals.

Singapore does not control prices (though it’s moving in that direction), it’s public hospitals are privately run, and it has a system of “forced savings” to make sure patients have enough money to cover out of pocket costs and buy health insurance. It’s ethos is “the patient has to pay something out of pocket, even if it’s just $2”. It’s also more than happy to tell poor patients “if you don’t have enough money, the…

Aren’t all 3 major hospital groups government owned? These are not private hospitals, they may charge you fees, but ultimately they’re government owned.

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#322

Post by wahnfrieden »

pc86 wrote: post #220
kev33 wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

There's no reason to come on here and be nasty to someone you've never met because you or some relative of yours had a bad experience. If it's that big of a deal for you, work to fix it and you can come on here with your credentials and blah blah instead of whining about people who have experience in what they're talking about :)

Civility is a little overrated and what an obnoxiously condescending response to say well go fix it yourself before you talk. Go talk to children like that

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#323

Post by mwerd »

RoadieRoller wrote: post #285

India is considered a "cheap and poor" country in many ways. It's GDP is 1/10th that of United States. Even then, India has free health care, and in many states (out of the 30+ states), Govt run healthcare is the best. Woman give birth to babies and walk out paying almost nothing, men break their bones and walk out paying nothing after a month of staying in hospitals and such. Insurance is never heard of or forced to…

Must be fairly recent then...cause 10 years ago it was poor quality care by untrained staff.

https://www.mhtf.org/2017/06/23/quality-of-routine-labor-and...

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#324

Post by xdmr »

To save anyone else similarly curious the trouble, here's a sample record from the Humana data set:

  {'REPORTING_ENTITY_NAME': 'Humana Inc',
   'REPORTING_ENTITY_TYPE': 'Health Insurance Issuer',
   'LAST_UPDATED_ON': '2022-08-24',
   'VERSION': '1.0.0',
   'NPI': '1629053517,1659354272',
   'TIN': '593279318',
   'TYPE': 'ein',
   'NEGOTIATION_ARRANGEMENT': 'ffs',
   'NAME': 'Nasal Prosthesis Replacement See Also Code 21087',
   'BILLING_CODE_TYPE': 'CDT',
   'BILLING_CODE_TYPE_VERSION': '2022',
   'BILLING_CODE': 'D5926',
   'DESCRIPTION': 'Nasal Prosthesis Replacement See Also Code 21087',
   'NEGOTIATED_TYPE': 'negotiated',
   'NEGOTIATED_RATE': '906.98',
   'EXPIRATION_DATE': '9999-12-31',
   'SERVICE_CODE': '',
   'BILLING_CLASS': 'professional',
   'BILLING_CODE_MODIFIER': '',
   'ADDITIONAL_INFO': '',
   'BUNDLED_BILLING_CODE_TYPE': '',
   'BUNDLED_BILLING_CODE_VERSION': '',
   'BUNDLED_BILLING_CODE': '',
   'BUNDLED_DESCRIPTION': ''}
I think I agree about the negotiation arrangement

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#325

Post by throwtheacctawy »

seaourfreed wrote: post #246

USA Healthcare is 19.5% of GDP. Canada + Australia + UK + (a few similar countries) average 10.5% of GDP. The USA healthcare price gouges via run away prices. Healthcare corporations corrupting congress is the fuel that forces this on people (and breaks a free market).

No post body was provided.

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#326

Post by trts »

emkoemko wrote: post #267
bottlepalm wrote: post #102

This is the real solution to healthcare costs and quality. Instead of the government handing hospitals a blank check for low quality services in a single payer scenario, we allow price transparency, competition and the free market to drive down costs and increase quality. Hate him if you want, but this was a huge accomplishment by Trump that has just started to take effect. If you think the government can bring down…

NASA?

NASA’s budget for 2022 is about $24 billion or roughly $145-$150 per working person.

Perhaps a lot of money depending on what you think should be prioritized. personally I think it’s hard to argue that they aren’t delivering something of high value to humanity, especially recently with the success of the JWST. And maybe very especially compared to other agencies.

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#327

Post by specialist »

chii wrote: post #253
seaourfreed wrote: post #246

USA Healthcare is 19.5% of GDP. Canada + Australia + UK + (a few similar countries) average 10.5% of GDP. The USA healthcare price gouges via run away prices. Healthcare corporations corrupting congress is the fuel that forces this on people (and breaks a free market).

But looking from another perspective - if healthcare is 20% of GDP, an awful amount of people are therefore paid directly due to this "waste". Any improvement in efficiency would mean those people lose out on jobs. A new use for them must be found, or there will be massive unemployment (at least, short-medium term).

Yup. For the (downvoting) peanut gallery: aka "political economy". Obama Admin's compromises wrt ACA reform vs jobs has been written about.

Another example of political economy is two different efforts to address climate crisis, with very different outcomes.

During the Obama Admin, the push was for carbon taxes. Wonks loved it. Logical, concise, moral. Complete nonstarter. Because carbon taxes has no built-in constituency that's willing to advocate and defend it.

Whereas in 2020, progressives pushed "green new deal" themed industrial policy and investment strategy. Made most everyone a benefactor. Millions of jobs. 100s of billions of dollars. Much better political economy.

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#328

Post by gravelc »

abigail95 wrote: post #312
seaourfreed wrote: post #246

USA Healthcare is 19.5% of GDP. Canada + Australia + UK + (a few similar countries) average 10.5% of GDP. The USA healthcare price gouges via run away prices. Healthcare corporations corrupting congress is the fuel that forces this on people (and breaks a free market).

AU is closer to double that

Reference please.

This says 10.2% as of 2020 : https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/health-welfare-expenditure/h...

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#329

Post by specialist »

BurningFrog wrote: post #309
e_i_pi_2 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that disproves a general trend that increased socialization in healthcare costs leads to better outcomes and less per-capita spending. Also FWIW France and Switzerland both have universal healthcare, under different systems where France splits payments 3 ways and covers more with the govt[1], and Switzerland seems to have a system like the ACA in the US where it's compulsory, but they also set caps on t…

> I don't think that disproves a general trend that increased socialization in healthcare costs leads to better outcomes and less per-capita spending. You also haven't given even a hint of proof for this alleged trend. Maybe there is a trend, but let's look at some serious data before we just assume it's an obvious fact.

Google healthcare cost per capita vs life expectancy.

Last time I checked, Canada, for example, spent 1/3rd less than the USA and Canadians lived a few years longer.

IIRC, of the "universal coverage" systems, Switzerland's ACA-like system had the highest per capita, but still less than USA's system.

Much has changed these last few years. eg Our life expectancy in the USA has fallen.

Re: Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

#330

Post by _ofdw »

jaarse wrote: post #272
seaourfreed wrote: post #246

USA Healthcare is 19.5% of GDP. Canada + Australia + UK + (a few similar countries) average 10.5% of GDP. The USA healthcare price gouges via run away prices. Healthcare corporations corrupting congress is the fuel that forces this on people (and breaks a free market).

I’m a Canadian, and I would never want to give up our single payer system. That being said, Canada has a huge health care problem right now. Frequently they need to close emergency services in major (& minor) cities at night due to staff shortages. The wait times for basic diagnostics is on the order of months (not days or weeks). For example, a relative of mine has lost 90 pounds since the start of the year, complai…

>Frequently they need to close emergency services in major (& minor) cities at night due to staff shortages. The wait times for basic diagnostics is on the order of months (not days or weeks).

Part of this is COVID burnout. It wasn't this bad in 2019. Wife works in healthcare and sees the difference every day. Nurses crying etc.

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