Case study: OH hospital pays for bills for competing hospitals

Tue, 13 May 2008 06:59:55 -0400

One Ohio hospital is so bent on putting together a comparison shopping tool that it's willing to pay patients for competitive information. Alliance (OH) Community Hospital is paying patients $100 for copies of bills--and corresponding explanations of insurance benefits forms--from competing hospitals. Once it gets enough information, it plans to post prices and related reimbursement levels for leading insurers on its website.

An Ohio law in effect since November 2006 already requires state hospitals to post prices for common procedures on their websites, as well as making hard copies of price lists available to patients. However, Alliance wanted to take things further in an effort to help consumers comparison-shop, CEO Stan Jonas told AMNews.

To learn more about the hospital's plans:
- read this AMNews piece

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FTC resolves high-profile IL hospital antitrust dispute

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 06:59:58 -0400

The FTC has ruled that a pair of healthcare organizations based in Illinois will need to contract with managed care plans separately to win the agency's final approval for their merger. The combined entity, Evanston Northwestern, could have been broken up, but the FTC decided not to take that course. The organizations, Evanston Northwestern Healthcare and Highland Park Hospital, merged in 2000. Last year, the FTC affirmed an administrative law judge's decision that concluded that Evanston's acquisition of Northwestern was anticompetitive.The agency noted that prices rose 50 percent or more in certain cases after the merger, while prices at Highland Park had only risen 4 to 6 percent for many years prior to the merger. Evanston had contended, however, that the price increases occurred only because Highland Park had done poorly in managed care negotiations prior to the deal.

To learn more about the FTC decision:
- read this Chicago Triune piece

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competition

Case study: OH hospital pays for bills for competing hospitals

FTC resolves high-profile IL hospital antitrust dispute