Says you. Time and again, Lasik surgery and cosmetic surgeries not covered by insurance or hindered by over-regulation have shown us that transparent pricing and competition work to make those procedures more affordable -- just like these forces work in other markets.
The State has perverted the medical market for more than half a century and you're just used to seeing it in its current screwed up state.
One might shop around for the best way to spend a spare $10,000 for an eye lift, but who can be expected to shop for an economically satisfying deal while in a life-threatening situation? Reducing regulation would not change this essential qualitative difference.
Even in emergencies, if you knew the reputation of a hospital and were responsible for paying your own bills, you'd likely go to the one that had the price/performance reputation that you were most comfortable with.
So if most surgery, and near all outpatient procedures are not-pressing and possible to shop around for, why can't I know how much it costs ahead of time?
Not true. Even in a sprawling place like Oklahoma City, most of the middle class lives within safe transport distance of several hospitals. It would be perfectly rational for them to tell the ambulance crew to drive another five minutes to save $25,000.
Most emergencies have plenty of time for price shopping.
> (...) It would be perfectly rational for them to tell the ambulance crew to drive another five minutes to save $25,000.
I wouldn't want to be in your care. If you're having a heart attack you want to get into a hospital ASAP. And that's coming from somebody that took a taxi to the hospital after being stabbed in the chest.
Free markets and transparent pricing that work require that there not be major information asymmetries between supplier and purchaser. If I'm in the hospital with an emergency or critical condition, I probably don't have the option of fully researching or understanding my options.
And even in my case, time wasn't a huge factor. From diagnosis to pre-surgical chemo and radiation, was over a week. And surgery was a month after that. Plenty of time to weigh cost versus performance.
I stated in my post: "If I'm in the hospital with an emergency or critical condition, I probably don't have the option of fully researching or understanding my options."
Just because situations exist where you have time to research, doesn't mean you always have time to do so. And a healthcare system needs to take that into consideration, especially when the consequences can be life or death.
Doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies play these obfuscation games in order to maximize revenues and profitability.
Removing unnecessary actors from the equation like employers and making pricing publicly visible would do wonders to reform the system.
The fact of the matter is that most surgery isn't emergency surgery. Most procedures can be researched and cost compared.
Even for semi-emergencies, illumination of pricing and other vital information would allow better decisions from consumers who at least knew the reputation of hospitals/providers in their area. I don't know how much a banana costs just now, but I know that if I need a really inexpensive one of dubious quality I can go to the super WalMart down the road. If I want a super fresh one that's probably more expensive, I can go to Whole Foods. If I want a "good enough" mid-price one, I can go to Publix.
In it, he makes a specific criticism that not only do hospitals that purchase diagnostic scanners tend to make greater use of it, but that quite often, an above-average count of referrals to diagnostic imaging centers (which are places which only do MRI and CT scan work) are one of the leading indicators of out-of-whack pricing for a given hospital.
Patients still reflexively follow their doctors orders. So if their doctor says an MRI or two is required before he proceeds with treatment, the patient will happily get the MRI done.
Changing the ingrained behavior of patients in this regard is a must if we expect to be able to control this particular aspect of medical cost increases.
sbercus10 has done this thread a huge favor in his comment (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6015542) where he provides the following link to a PDF of Brill's Time article:
