APCDs are the backbone of price transparency efforts!

Report Card on State Price Transparency Lays

Newtown, CT - July 10, 2015

When we launched our national report card on Price Transparency, TIME released its landmark article by Steve Brill, and public opinion and consciousness shifted - Since then, while the  scores of most States have made little progress, that, like many other things in the industry, is about to change. During the past two years a significant amount of legislation has been introduced in State Legislatures around the country. Many have failed at the first try, underscoring the entrenched and significant forces of the status quo beneficiaries. But others have succeeded, thus further debunking the myths that have passed as legal arguments to block price transparency. With every new legislative success, the false arguments are torn to shreds, as is the credibility of those who profess them. To arm State Legislators, this year's Price Transparency Report Card includes an Appendix that takes a close look at the most-often used arguments against releasing pricing information. We hope that it will be put to good use, and we also suggest that State Legislators look to their colleagues in New Mexico, Oregon, Connecticut and other states that have spent the past year battling and winning against the forces of price opacity. Beyond State-based activity, the private sector has also taken an important lead. Most health plans have adopted price estimators in order to better compete against third party solutions like CastLight or Change Healthcare. A few health plans have also banded to assemble their entire claims datasets into a new not-for-profit, the Health Care Cost Institute. While this latest effort is laudable, it cannot and should not be used by health plans as an excuse to fight against State-specific all-payer claims databases (APCDs), and some of the recent discourse coming out of HCCI is concerning.

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