Whether you are recently unemployed, a college graduate, or a hard-working professional with a family to provide for, the prices for health care services are enough to make your heart stop. Americans are trained to think that without insurance, they simply can’t afford good health care. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Medical Care for the Uninsured even states, “Americans without insurance don’t get the health care that those with insurance do.” Well we’re here to ask who the idiots are now, because readers, that is just simply not true anymore.
The quagmire of cost variations and the questions they bring, have built up in the minds of patients and providers alike as a result of the utter disrepair our health care system has found itself in, and now it needs a solution. That solution is self-pay, or cash-pay, whatever you want to call it. In the past, physicians have shied away from promoting self-pay pricing within their facilities due to a myriad of reasons that usually relate back to low collections. However, with insurance companies cutting reimbursement, those physicians have found themselves trapped in quite the Catch-22.
Hospital systems have suffered the most when it comes to cash-pay collections, which is one of the many reasons the list prices for services like MRIs are so high there. They are having to cover-up for the patients that never pay-up.
What patients often don’t realize, is that their medical decisions are 100% up to them and they should price shopfor their services in the same way that they shop for cars. Thanks to a new trend of pricing transparency, patients are seeing the light. The Pueblo, Colorado newspaper, The Pueblo Chieftain, wrote an article about the wide-ranging prices for MRIs in their area, showing the disparities between the hospital system and the independent diagnostic imaging facilities. “Cash-paying patients in Colorado can shell out as much as $3,460 for a basic shoulder MRI, but a little shopping around can cut that cost to $450.” If you could save over $3,000 on an MRI, and still receive the same level of service and care, why wouldn’t you?
So, patients are obviously at a pricing advantage when you look at it this way, but we like win-win situations, so we found a solution that benefits both patients and providers. That solution is Save On Medical. For physicians, Save On Medical ensures that chasing after collections is a thing of the past, by collecting the previously agreed upon service cost ahead of time. Patients have the ability to price shop for services in their area in one place, without having to call around to 20 different facilities and question whether or not they are paying for quality care because the Docometer grades each option. Studies show that on average, families end up paying upwards of $4,000 a year out-of-pocket for medical services, or they could just go to Save On Medical first.