House health panel ponders price transparency proposals

House lawmakers are considering several bills Thursday to make health care pricing more transparent, Modern Healthcare reports. The Energy and Commerce's health subcommittee "plans to take up a trio of bills aimed at increasing transparency and clarity in healthcare pricing, tackling an issue that has bedeviled the industry for decades and handcuffed efforts to turn everyday people into better purchasers of care." Rep. Steve Kagen, D-Wis., a physician, introduced legislation requiring "hospitals, doctors, nurses, pharmacies and a range of manufacturers and vendors to openly disclose prices. Failure to do so would result in a financial penalty to be determined by HHS." Two competing bills sponsored by Texas Republicans would take similar approaches (DoBias, 5/5).

---

This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.