Out-of-Pocket
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Health Affairs: Rising Use Of Observation Care Among The Commercially Insured May Lead to Total And Out-Of-Pocket Cost Savings
Tags: Commercially Insured, Health Affairs, Inpatient Spending, Observation Stays, Out-of-Pocket, Peer Reviewed Journals
Read more: Health Affairs: Rising Use Of Observation Care Among The Commercially Insured May Lead to Total And Out-Of-Pocket Cost SavingsABSTRACT: Proponents of hospital-based observation care argue that it has the potential to reduce health care spending and lengths-of-stay, compared to short-stay inpatient hospitalizations. However, critics have raised concerns about the out-of-pocket spending associated with observation care. Recent reports of high out-of-pocket spending among Medicare beneficiaries have received considerable media attention and have prompted direct policy…
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Wall Street Journal: The Math Behind Higher Health-Care Deductibles
Read more: Wall Street Journal: The Math Behind Higher Health-Care DeductiblesBy. Melanie Evans, Yaryna Serkez, and Merrill Sherman More U.S. workers are taking a bigger out-of-pocket hit from their employer-provided health plans. Blame high deductibles. High-deductible plans required patients to spend $2,200 to $4,300, on average, in 2016 before insurance kicked in, and amounts can be significantly more. Employers have embraced high deductibles to cut…
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Trends in Total and Out-of-Pocket Spending in Metro Areas: 2012-2015
Read more: Trends in Total and Out-of-Pocket Spending in Metro Areas: 2012-2015This data brief examines geographic variation in health care per capita spending, with a focus on consumer per capita out-of-pocket spending across geographies (2012-2015). It also explores whether the proportion of people enrolled in consumer-directed health plans (CDHPs) and the proportion not utilizing health care services had any influence on out-of-pocket spending.
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Health Affairs: Reference Pricing Changes the ‘Choice Architecture’ of Health Care for Consumers
Read more: Health Affairs: Reference Pricing Changes the ‘Choice Architecture’ of Health Care for ConsumersABSTRACT: Reference pricing in health insurance creates incentives for patients to select for nonemergency services providers that charge relatively low prices and still offer high quality of care. It changes the “choice architecture” by offering standard coverage if the patient chooses cost-effective providers but requires considerable consumer cost sharing if more expensive alternatives are selected….
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JAMA Internal Medicine: A Perspective on Out-of-Pocket Spending
Read more: JAMA Internal Medicine: A Perspective on Out-of-Pocket SpendingTo the Editor Understanding out-of-pocket spending is critical to understanding health care costs in the United States. We applaud the efforts of Adrion et al as an important contribution to understanding the out-of-pocket spending of the commercially insured population younger than 65 years. The commercially insured comprise over 50% of the nonelderly US population and, as…
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Health Payer Intelligence: Deductibles, Out-of-Pocket Healthcare Spending Rose 3% in 2015
Read more: Health Payer Intelligence: Deductibles, Out-of-Pocket Healthcare Spending Rose 3% in 2015By: Vera Gruessner Healthcare spending within the private health insurance market has grown 4.6 percent in 2015, according to a press release from the Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI). This type of growth in spending is higher than in recent years. For instance, healthcare spending in 2014 saw a 2.6 percent rise while 2013 spending…
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CNBC: High-deductible plans tied to lower health use, higher out-of-pocket spending
Read more: CNBC: High-deductible plans tied to lower health use, higher out-of-pocket spendingBy: Dan Mangan Your less expensive health insurance plan could cost you — even if you use less health care. People in so-called consumer-driven health plans tend to use fewer medical services than people with other types of coverage, a new study finds. But they also tend to spend substantially more out of their own…
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Consumer-Driven Health Plans: A Cost and Utilization Analysis
Read more: Consumer-Driven Health Plans: A Cost and Utilization AnalysisThis data brief examines the health care use and spending from 2010-2014 for people who are enrolled in consumer-driven health plans (CDHPs), and compares these trends to non-CDHP enrollees. Findings indicate that although fewer total dollars were spent on health care for CDHP enrollees, they had higher per capita out-of-pocket spending on deductibles, copays, and…
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JAMA Internal Medicine: Out-of-Pocket Spending for Hospitalizations Among Nonelderly Adults
Read more: JAMA Internal Medicine: Out-of-Pocket Spending for Hospitalizations Among Nonelderly AdultsABSTRACT Importance: Patients’ out-of-pocket spending for major health care expenses, such as inpatient care, may result in substantial financial distress. Limited contemporary data exist on out-of-pocket spending among nonelderly adults. Objectives: To evaluate out-of-pocket spending associated with hospitalizations and to assess how this spending varied over time and by patient characteristics, region, and type of…
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Spending on Shoppable Services in Health Care
Read more: Spending on Shoppable Services in Health CareThis issue brief examines health care spending on shoppable services in 2011. Contrary to expectations, giving consumers prices so they can shop for health care services may only have a modest effect on reducing health spending. Key Findings: In 2011, about 43% of the $524.2 billion spent on health care services for commercially insured people…