Question

health economics question!! how do hospitals, physicians, and consumers contribute to the rising cost of health care?

Answer 1

Healthcare consumers are the key stakeholders in patient-centered and patient-driven care. Consumers play a critical role in the medical decision-making process, making choices that ultimately impact the value of care delivered on both individual and societal levels. As a result, healthcare consumerism has been identified as a powerful tool to accelerate changes in the delivery of care. To further explore the variety of policies and perspectives central to effectively engage consumers in choosing higher-value services, panelists in this session discuss such tools as value-based purchasing and transparency. Healthcare market as one shrouded by obscurity around costs, prices, and quality. Even though the healthcare system depends on market forces to allocate care services, it falls short and places patients and consumers at a distinct disadvantage. However, opportunities to address the information asymmetry in the healthcare market are many. An overview of some of these strategies, including a focus on comparative effectiveness research, which if performed by neutral, credible, and independent sources, could provide meaningful comparisons and enable fair cost analyses.In a system where consumers feel little impact from variations in pricing because of insurance coverage, for instance, the impact of price transparency is significantly mitigated, barring fundamental change to the healthcare market. However, the quality transparency provides a better tool for engaging providers and informing consumer choices. Access to these data in the form of physical access but also in the form of providing information that is easily understood and used by consumers will drive better quality in health care as consumer decisions supply an incentive for better care. Patients and consumers are now especially disadvantaged when it comes to the lack of transparency around the price and cost of healthcare products and services. Shielded in the past by comprehensive public or private insurance coverage, consumers are faced with substantial increases in cost sharing. Significant increases in bankruptcy related to healthcare costs for insured middle-class Americans indicate how perilous this transition has become. As costs increase, market proponents should insist that consumers have access to comparative information, the price and cost of the products or services compared, and an analysis of the possible scenarios relevant to their purchasing decision.