At Spot-On, Matthew Holt examines the issue of practice variation--"what happens when the same patient with exactly the same symptoms or disease receives radically different treatment based only upon where they live, or in many cases, on precisely which doctor they see." This phenomenon causes a wide variation in prices for medical services and I think we all know what kind of problems that can cause. Once an obscure topic in healthcare, practice variation has become increasingly important in the face of rising healthcare costs and increased transparency. Blog