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Ending Bad Medical Billing Practices Requires a Tsunami of Patients to Speak Up and ACT!

Ending Bad Medical Billing Practices Requires a Tsunami of Patients to Speak Up and ACT!Talk to any stranger about the cumbersome medical bills that we encounter, and you will surely find something in common with that person – regardless of political party, religion, gender, ethnicity or place of residence. The fact is, whether or not you have health insurance, few of us are happy with the hefty medical bills we are prompted to pay.

Recently, a book was published that addresses how patients should carefully scrutinize their medical bills before paying them. The book, “Never Pay The First Bill and Other Ways to Fight the Health Care System and Win,” was written by ProPublica investigative journalist, Marshall Allen. Many of Allen’s resources and strategies to demand fair prices make intuitive sense…but it requires patience and persistence from each of us.

Price gouging continues to be a huge reason why the U.S. spends more money on healthcare than any other wealthy country. Seeking care requires one to navigate a complex system that too often provides unnecessary treatment, elicits erroneous medical bills that require higher cost-sharing with patients, and necessitates complicated communications with insurance companies, hospitals and other care professionals. 

Medical Debt

About one in six Americans have medical debt in collections. Sadly, this number appears to be increasing. A good reason – other than being uninsured – is that a rising number of Americans are enrolled in high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). HDHPs are commonly used with health savings accounts (HSAs), which are tax-free spending accounts that help people pay for their out-of-pocket costs. However, the HSAs are typically funded by the employee, reducing their disposable income for other essential items, such as food and housing.

According to a 2018 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), 19 percent of U.S. households carried medical debt – costs that people are unable to pay up front or when they receive care. The median amount owed by households was $2,000.

A CNBC report from 2019 indicated that two-thirds of people (66.5 percent) who file for bankruptcy cite medical issues as the reason. In fact, an estimated 530,000 families turn to bankruptcy each year because of medical issues and bills.

Below is a medical debt breakdown by SIPP based on race, education level, family composition, region and poverty status.

How Common are Errors in Medical Bills?

Most people who take time to review their medical bills say they contain errors. Whether we are charged for services or procedures that were not performed, or upcoding, which is assigning an inaccurate billing code to a medical procedure or treatment which will increase the cost to the payer(s). Plain and simple, upcoding is nothing short of fraud. Much too often, patients unknowingly pay for these ‘mistakes.’

According to a July 6 Wall Street Journal article, after “studying thousands of prices at hundreds of hospitals,” many hospitals charge top prices to uninsured patients who must pay cash out of pocket. The difference of payment required between those insured and those uninsured are substantial. Even those who have insurance may find their policy will not cover a particular procedure, leaving the individual to assume the entire billed amount on their own. This finding is not terribly earth shattering, as it has been street knowledge for years that insurers are able to drastically reduce billed charges down to a more ‘reasonable’ amount. But what insurance companies have ‘negotiated’ to pay hospitals is still multiples higher than what Medicare pays these very same hospitals for the same procedures.

Based on research, medical billing errors are so frequent that four out of five bills contain at least minor errors. Insurance companies may find some of these errors, but ultimately, most medical claims are auto-adjudicated, which means most errors fall through the cracks at the insurance company, leaving patients with unfair bills to pay. Marshall Allen asks both a fair and fundamental question: Who are the REAL customers of the insurance company – the hospitals and physicians, or those who actually pay for the insurance coverage?

What You Can Do to Combat Medical Bills

Allen does a wonderful job of describing what you can do when confronted with medical bills that appear to be unreasonable (most are, by the way). Primarily, Allen recommends that people always request an itemized medical bill from the hospital and other medical providers. This bill should include a list of all the charges that add up to the total, in addition to including the billing codes – also known as Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) – that the provider used when they filed the insurance claim on your behalf. With these itemized billing codes, you can perform your own research on what is considered to be ‘fair’ prices. Yes, this process can be intimidating, even for those of us who are tangentially involved in the healthcare industry.

Itemized bills, by the way, are not terribly common in the U.S., primarily because patients assume and expect their insurance company to process the bills to ensure accuracy and appropriateness. This is a big assumption that may not happen. If more Americans would request an itemized bill from hospitals and other providers, it would force billing departments to make this a standard procedure. If not, people can insist on legislation in their states or nationally to ensure that every hospital bill is itemized. By doing this, more transparency will force the billing practice to become more accountable to payers and patients.

Through his research, Allen has found that hospital bills can be negotiated down to a more reasonable amount, whether through collection agencies who are hired by hospitals, or by ‘debt buyers’ who purchase the hospital debt at pennies on the dollar.  Debt buyers will subsequently discount the list price greatly in order to profit from what they paid the hospital. According to one source quoted by Allen, people can get about an 85 percent discount off the list price of the debt. This is quite substantial.

Closing Remarks

Because Americans pay far more per capita for our healthcare, this book is a must read. Without giving away Allen’s ‘secret sauce’ within this blog, this book should be purchased and read cover to cover. Marshall Allen was also a guest on Reconstructing Healthcare, where he describes his book (audio below). Information gleaned from resources like these will make it easier for patients, employees and employers to more confidently push back on our perverse health system, and actually win!  

 

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Reforming Rx Pricing
First Reform Pharma Campaign Contributions

Both political parties seem to be in agreement that skyrocketing drug costs of specialty drugs and new drugs coming on the market threaten to bankrupt the system. Yet pharmaceutical companies, pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) and their powerful lobbying efforts have a proven track record in preventing bold measures to address high drug prices.

It’s no mystery why we cannot have an unified national policy on how to control outrageously high prescription medications. It all begins with campaign contributions that impact how national drug policies are made.

According to a recent analysis by STAT, over two-thirds of Congress (374 of 535 voting members) have received campaign contributions from the pharmaceutical industry during the 2020 election cycle. During 2020, the drug industry sector donated $14 million to influence 72 senators and 302 members of the House of Representatives. Overall, however, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America raised nearly $527 million in 2019 and spent roughly $506 million on ‘dark money’ groups, according to OpenSecrets. More specifically, the drug industry focused on those in key committees that impact healthcare legislation. (It should also be noted that Pharma has funded more than 2,400 state lawmaker campaigns in 2020.)

Such campaign contributions must meet certain guidelines to be legal. These contributions can certainly influence those who wish to get elected (or re-elected) to powerful and influential positions to influence government health policy. Quid pro quo is alive and well for those we elect to Congress and our statehouses. I would like to believe that influence cannot be bought, but politics is an ugly process. The lawmakers who accept these contributions represent both sides of the aisle. As STAT mentioned, “Despite the drug industry’s apparent interest in preventing Democrats from controlling both Congress and the White House, contributions were almost evenly split between major political parties: $7.1 million went to Republicans, and $6.6 million went to Democrats.”

Iowa Senators

Have Iowa Senators, Charles Grassley and Joni Ernst, resisted the urge to accept drug-industry money?

According to STAT, Senator Grassley, who has a proposal to fix drug prices, received a total of $32,500 from the drug industry during the 2020 election cycle. The specific donations from each drug company can be found in the STAT analysis. Grassley, it must be mentioned, does not propose that the Health and Human Services Secretary negotiate drug prices with Pharma. Pharma desires to avoid having the federal government directly control drug prices.

As for Senator Joni Ernst, the results are even more pronounced. Sen. Ernst, who was in a re-election dog fight with Theresa Greenfield in 2020, required ‘all hands on deck’ from campaign supporters. Sen. Ernst received $102,000 in campaign contributions from various drug companies. Again, STAT provides the breakout of the specific contributions from each drug company. Sen. Ernst has pressed for “lower prescription drug costs,” but to do so, the U.S. must “adhere to market-driven principles” that would be more pleasing to Pharma than having government-negotiated pricing.

It’s worth noting that House Representative Richard Hudson, Republican from North Carolina, was the top recipient for drug industry funds – $139,500 in 2020. Rep. Hudson is on the influential Energy and Commerce Health subcommittee, which oversees a large portion of healthcare legislation in Congress.

Summary

The drug industry has hastened yet another addiction crisis – the reliance on campaign contributions that compromises objectivity toward fixing a long-standing problem in our healthcare system.

Understanding the drug pricing policy in our country must first begin with how our congressional representatives are funded during their campaigns. Yes, this may sound too simplistic, but in our government – specifically with healthcare – it boils down to following the money trail. This is the ugliness of how policymaking works in Washington and our statehouses. Until campaign financing can be ethically cleansed, we are mere pawns in a game that will largely be decided by others – regardless of how we vote.

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Is Healthcare a ‘Tapeworm’ in the American Economy?

Tapeworms cause health problems in our bodies. They can rob us of important nutrients, block our intestines, and take up space in organs so they don’t function normally. Tapeworms keep our bodies from operating efficiently.

Warren Buffett described the American healthcare system as a “tapeworm in the American economy.” Given the latest failure of Haven, a joint health care venture with JP Morgan, Amazon and Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway – the tapeworm appears to be live and well.

Buffett’s comment is brutally honest.

The tapeworm analogy is demonstrated in a new article from the New York Times, “Buoyed by Federal Covid Aid, Big Hospital Chains Buy Up Competitors.” This article paints a picture that some larger hospital chains are using Covid bailout money from the Provider Relief Fund and purchasing other hospitals and physician groups to grow their footprint in markets. Without much federal scrutiny, this bailout allows hospital chains to grow larger and dictate higher prices from private insurers, employers and individuals.

Multiplier Effect

I have to hand it to the American Hospital Association (AHA) and their state-based hospital members, including the Iowa Hospital Association (IHA). When payers demand to hold hospitals accountable to improve their outcomes at lower associated costs, hospitals revert to a tried-and-true formula to combat public scrutiny: Remind the public about how hospitals provide economic contributions to our communities and states.

As an example, in 2017, the AHA stated the “Health care sector has traditionally been an economic mainstay, providing stability and job growth in communities. Health care added more than 35,000 jobs per month in 2016.” The AHA mentions that hospitals employ more than 5.7 million workers, are one of the top sources of private-sector jobs, and purchase nearly $852 billion in goods and services from other businesses. More recently, Rick Pollack, President and CEO of the AHA, had a paid AHA advertisement in the Wall Street Journal titled, “Value of Health Systems Shown Clearly During the Pandemic.

This information is pumped out every few years for each state to tout, including Iowa. The AHA provides a state-by-state economic impact grid that illustrates the value hospitals provide to their respective local economies. The IHA readily uses this information to display on their website. Of course, we are constantly reminded of the ‘multiplying effect’ that supports “thousands of additional jobs.” We are told that “more than 143,000 jobs are tied to Iowa hospitals, creating an overall impact that is worth nearly $8.6 billion to Iowa’s economy.” It is true that, along with public schools, hospitals are the largest employers within many of our communities.

Not to be outdone, the lobbying organization for insurance companies – America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) – employs a similar approach to tout how private insurance is an economic boon for local economies. In early May, AHIP posted By the Numbers: How Health Insurance Providers Contribute to State Economies and Peace of Mind.” The 2021 AHIP biennial report discusses how the economies of each state are impacted by health plans, specifically on the number of jobs generated and tax revenues paid to support the local economy.

Based on AHIP data, Iowa employs over 4,000 health plan employees and almost 13,000 insurance-related employees. Average annual wages for health plan employees are over $86,000 while insurance-related employees earn about $63,000 annually. By most standards, these wages are good for the Iowa economy, especially when using the multiplier effect.

Zero-Sum Game

Given the narratives being sold to us, perhaps we should supersize the entire U.S. economy by continuing to expand healthcare and health plans beyond their current size. But that simply will not work. There are economic tradeoffs that come into play.

It brings to mind poker and gambling, two popular examples of the zero-sum game. In poker, the sum of the amounts won by some players equals the combined losses of other players. In a zero-sum game, there is one winner and one loser.

“Currently, the U.S. healthcare and health insurance systems are really a patchwork of different programs, which create gaps and expensive inefficiencies”, according to economic health researcher, Katherine Baicker.

But who pays for these inefficiencies? ALL OF US.

What we pay to healthcare providers and insurers will indeed fund the job growth of doctors, nurses, medical technicians, health insurance personnel and professionals. To be sure, we need these services. But, as a consequence, we don’t have this money to spend (or save) on other economic necessities or preferences. This becomes an economic tradeoff that adversely impacts other parts of our economy.

Inefficient and opaque spending on healthcare creates another problem: a redistribution of our hard-earned money that is often being used to our own detriment – for lobbying efforts to ensure the status quo remains unchanged. Opaqueness breeds blind spending by those who pay. This is a vicious cycle that perpetuates the zero-sum game.

Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns & Opportunity Costs

Another economic term, Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns, is typically used when analyzing the production of a particular commodity. For example, when a factory employs workers to manufacture its products, at some point during production, the company will operate at an optimal level (with all other factors remaining constant). Over time, however, adding additional workers will result in less efficient operations.

At what point has healthcare exceeded the optimal revenue from its payers? When will the best possible returns obtained by healthcare diminish with every dollar invested? Are we there yet? The latest Kaiser Health News poll that found large employers are ready for more government involvement may suggest this point has been reached.

Put yet another way, what are the opportunity costs with each dollar spent on healthcare? Opportunity cost is the loss of the benefit that could have been enjoyed if the best alternative choice was chosen instead. Continuing to pay higher healthcare costs without receiving the commensurate benefits represents a lost opportunity of investing that money elsewhere – such as investing in updated infrastructures, efficient factory equipment or paying higher wages. Redirecting financial investments into other worthwhile opportunities would provide a multiplier effect for local economies.

Continuing to accept overpriced care is not the solution to sustain economic growth. In fact, overpriced and inefficient care is holding the economy back from becoming MORE robust. This is precisely Buffett’s point.

Summary

Contrary to the argument of being an ‘economic stimulus’ to local economies, the REAL purpose of healthcare is to enhance the quality of life by enhancing our health. It is true that creating reasonable profits to remain financially viable is necessary to stay in business to serve others. However, healthcare must focus on creating social health and well-being to fulfill its fundamental promise to society.

Marketing platforms being used by healthcare-related associations on how hospitals and health plans will benefit our communities is, at best, disingenuous. We live in a world of unfulfilled opportunities. Until these opportunities are given the chance to succeed, we will never know just how robust our economy can become.

How long do we allow the tapeworm to control our economic well-being?

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