A rule change announced in August that will require hospitals to list prices online and update the prices annually will start on Jan. 1.
Previously, hospitals only needed to provide standard pricing to people upon request.
Hospitals are required to update the information at least once a year, or more often as appropriate.
Experts said that comparing prices of different hospitals could end up saving people money.
Sometimes the cheapest option isn’t the best, though, experts noted.
Seema Verma, head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said the new transparency requirement for online prices is in line with the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to encourage patients to become better-educated decision-makers regarding their own care.
“This is a small step towards providing our beneficiaries with price transparency, but our work in this area is only just beginning,” she said.
“Price transparency is core to patient empowerment and making sure American patients have the tools they need so they can make the best decisions for them and their families.”
A study in 2017 from Duke University found that most people searching online for how much they'd pay for a medical procedure couldn’t find accurate pricing.
Researchers using Google and Bing for the prices of four non-emergency medical procedures including a cholesterol panel lab test in eight cities weren’t able to find full pricing information.
“There is a disconnect between policies that seek to encourage people to be smarter consumers and the availability of information that allows them to make the most cost-effective decisions,” added Peter Ubel, a professor at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. “Policymakers who want consumers to participate in controlling costs need to ensure that prices are available to the average person.”
The study was published as a research letter in JAMA internal medicine in December 2017.
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