This editorial was written with Charles Sauer
Don’t take our word for it. You can try this out yourself. Just google Surgery Center of Oklahoma and here is what you will find. For Achilles tendon repair, you will pay $5,730. That’s not an estimate with a huge variance around it. It’s a package price that includes doctor, nurse, anesthesia, room, drugs, supplies – everything. For rotator cuff repair, the price is $8,260. For carpal tunnel release, it’s $2,750. All these prices are posted online for everyone to see. For more examples, see the table below. The center is owned by Dr. Keith Smith, an Oklahoma anesthesiologist who started posting prices about the same time the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) was enacted. Since then he has adjusted his prices (downward!) five times......
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My Take - This confusion on billing - who's billing you for what part of a procudure and how they justify the billing borders on mysticism. I don't know if this standard everywhere in the country but here in Ohio if I have an X-Ray it has to be viewed by a radiologist, and he sends me a separate bill. Why? I didn't hire him so why does he bill me? Why doesn't he bill the doctor who hired him and the doctor bill me. That's how I have to do business. If I have to hire extra help for some project or other I pay them and then charge the account. Why is it different in medicine?
Because it's all become a huge scam, and it's done by keeping the patients as ignorant and confused as possible, and I blame the insurance companies. If they demanded a one bill process - we'd get a one bill process, just as someone would if they contracted me for some pest control service, and I would have to submit a proposal for the cost ahead of time - and live with it. That's universal in the pest control industry, as it is in most industries - all except medicine. I will say it - it's corruption of the system - a corruption competition can fix! Just as it does in all other industries.
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