Diagnosing, Doctor to Doctor     

   Dr. Robert Berry, a reader of WORLD magazine, and medical correspondent Dr. Charles Horton, offer ways to lower healthcare costs. 

   Dr. Berry: A tax credit for health savings accounts would

make healthcare fairer. Putting more dollars into the hands
of consumers will enable us to choose our own way of
sharing catastrophic risk, while purchasing elective medical care directly from providers we select.

   In my own direct-pay primary care practice, my fees are
one-third to one-half of those charged by insurance-based practices.

   Dr. Horton: Dr. Berry's argument is most applicable in primary-care fields like internal medicine and pediatrics, and in services like lab testing. Entrepreneurs are charging a cash price lower than insurance "co-pays." 

   Anti-competitive behavior among hospitals and insurers needs to end. Each facility should charge one price for a given procedure, regardless.  Patients should be free to choose any facility without penalty, and any given insurance product should be for sale to anyone. 

   Dr. Berry: Obamacare (practically created a cartel) where hospitals can get away with charging patients $502 for a B12 test, which costs the patient $25 at mine. 
     Perhaps a better and fairer way would be to allow Americans to deduct from their income any "legitimate" healthcare expense (including out-of-pocket expenses to doctors, pharmacies, hospitals, etc.) instead of starting at 10 percent of AGI.

   Dr. Horton: Prices should be public. President Trump should mandate that all hospitals publish that information online and keep it current. In what other business is it considered optional to tell customers what they'll pay?

   We've already seen the benefit that internet-based, price-comparison services bring to prescriptions. There should also be one price per specific procedure at each hospital, with no discounts for anyone - including insurers. Self-pay patients will get the same effective price as the insurers do.

      Jimmy