Same Medical Procedure, Same Hospital, Different Costs: Why and What You Can Do About It?

Today’s guest is Michael O’Neil, Sr. Vice President of Strategy & Development for Healthcare Bluebook. Healthcare Bluebook, started in 2007, is a digital platform that combines objective price and quality data with industry-leading usability helping employers and employees get the best price for their upcoming medical procedure. Healthcare Bluebook provides people and organizations with everything they need to be more effective healthcare consumers. Michael joins us today to discuss the lack of transparency in the American healthcare system and how his company has established a streamlined rating system of healthcare options to help patients decide where to have their next medical procedure done. Listen to the podcast to learn about: • What Healthcare Bluebook does • The difference between actual cost and billed charges in healthcare • Price transparency problems in the US health system • Why transparency is such a big issue in healthcare • How the health system is geared to benefit payers • Why profit caps for payers has driven up treatment costs • Why self-insured employers could be the best bet for driving change in healthcare price transparency • Cherry picking which provider is best and identifying who is worst for your next medical procedure • How Healthcare Bluebook made data around medical procedures easily digestible for consumers • The future of price discrepancy and price transparency