TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL)--The Obama Administration released a report with the Center for Medicare and Medicaid with the goal of creating transparency to help make the health system more accountable and affordable.
Price tags don't vary just in the Emergency Room.
The new report shows that if a person gets a hip replacement it could have two separate prices depending on where you live.
A patient that lives in Oklahoma could be charged $5,000 dollars, while someone in California could be charged up to $200,000 thousand dollars for the very same operation.
Tallahassee Memorial Hospital spokesperson Warren Jones says “I think people in our area should be aware, that in this area they are going to receive some of the most cost effective and efficient health care in the state of Florida.
Soon health care services could have the same price tag no matter where you live.
More transparency is expected as we get closer to universal healthcare going into affect in 2013.
“It's apart of what is going to going on with the healthcare reform act…what is happening is that healthcare is going to change dramatically over the next few years and the public needs to be aware of that and these reports are very important for the public to understand what is happening in the healthcare system,” said Jones
When it comes to determining the dollars and cents for hospitals bills a number of factors come into play.
Jones says “the intensity of the services they are going to provide and the amount of equipment that may be required and the technology that may be required and the human resources required and all of that put together for a charge for procedure.”
