Patient Engagement
A recent American Journal of Managed Care study has confirmed prices for care in a hospital outpatient department tend to be higher than those for the same service performed in a physician's office.
Across the country, more than 50 rural hospitals have closed over the last six years, and another 283 are in fragile financial condition, according to the National Rural Health Association.
Two states are making inroads into revealing some of the biggest secrets of health care by publishing price information to help consumers comparison shop for doctors, dentists and prescription drugs.
Retail clinics, long seen as an antidote to more expensive doctor offices and emergency rooms, may actually boost medical spending by leading consumers to get more care, a new study shows.
Most of the people running for president say they want to do something about the rising cost of prescription drugs. But most of their proposals probably won't work because they don't address the dynamics behind these price increases.
MIT Sloan Professor Andrew Lo, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute's David Weinstock, and MIT post-doctoral fellow Vahid Montazerhodjat have identified this as a time when breakthrough therapies for certain types of cancers, hepatitis C, and rare diseases exist but remain out of reach for many patients, due primarily to the prohibitive cost.
Contradictory results between how patients view home health agencies and how the government rates them are hardly unusual. One in five agencies had clinical and patient ratings that differed by two stars or more, a Kaiser Health News analysis of government records shows.
More women with breast cancer -- and an increasing number without -- are choosing to have mastectomies over more breast-sparing procedures. And nearly half don't spend a single night in the hospital but go home the same day, new government data show.
St. Clair Hospital in Pittsburgh and Experian Health, the healthcare-focused business branch of Experian, announced a new online cost transparency tool Monday called Patient Estimates that will make it easier for patients to get a clear picture of what their out-of-pocket financial obligations will be for services at the Hospital or it's outpatient centers.
Pain care for patients already taking opioids can be improved by bringing together multiple non-opioid treatment strategies during hospitalization, a new study has found.