Kaiser Health News offers an interesting article on a large scale allergy test for which Stanford charged a state employee patient over $48,000. The insurer paid around $11,000 to this in-network provider which left the patientwith about $3,000 in coinsurance. She was able to negotiate the coinsurance down to about $1,500. The article advises that
Insurers often tell patients to “shop around” for the best price and to make sure they choose in-network providers to avoid surprises. [The patient] did everything right and still got caught out. As a state employee, she had great insurance and Stanford was an in-network provider. [The patient] said her doctor warned her the test would be expensive, but she never anticipated that could mean close to $50,000. So don’t be afraid to ask for specific numbers: “Expensive” and “cheap” can have hugely different meanings in the high-priced U.S. health system.Well put.
Drug Store News tells us about a Walgreen's survey on American attitudes toward the flu shot. 70% of those survey plan to get the vaccination. Get a load of this though --
The survey also found that despite the severity of last year’s flu season — one of the worst in recent years — some 37% of respondents said they had gone to work while suffering from the flu. Additionally, 2-in-5 of those surveyed said they stay home to protect themselves from the flu.No bueno.
To cap off cybersecurity month, the Department of Health and Human Services today announced the official opening of the Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center (HC3) at HHS headquarters in Washington, DC. "The HC3’s role is to work with the sector, including practitioners, organizations, and cybersecurity information sharing organizations to understand the threats it faces, learn the bad guys’ patterns and trends, and provide information and approaches on how the sector can better defend itself."
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