The report examined data from a recent Colorado Consumer Health Initiative & Altarum Value Hub poll, and a RAND Corp. study with the Employers’ Forum of Indiana.
The RAND Corp. study showed that hospitals were paid, on average, 2.4 times Medicare rates for services provided to privately insured patients in 2017, and that these prices paid to hospitals vary widely.
The Colorado Business Group on Health and the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative specifically looked at the Denver market as an example. Their report showed that prices for 10 routine procedures in the Denver market had an average variance of 837 percent in 2017.
A shoulder MRI (no contrast) had the greatest variance between the lowest and highest prices in the market, at 1,111 percent. That was followed by chest CT (no contrast) (1,005 percent), abdominal ultrasound (895 percent) and knee arthroscopy (839 percent).
Read the full report here.
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