Culture of overspending can’t be fixed by data

It Starts with Perception Even though there is no evidence that higher prices translate into higher quality, many consumers still believe this to be true. In a survey published by Health Affairs, a journal of health policy research, most of the people who had compared pricing believed price and quality were associated. Thus, the challenge for healthcare providers is to train consumers to understand pricing and how it relates to quality, and to educate them on how best to compare the medical services being offered. Price transparency was designed to give consumers more control of their spending and, by extension, lower overall healthcare spending. The Harvard Medical School study revealed a need for healthcare providers to find better ways to engage consumers to research medical costs. “We’re trying to change a culture here,” said Barbara Anthony, a senior fellow in healthcare at the Pioneer Institute, a non-profit think tank, in an article by the Boston Globe . “You don’t do that by saying, ‘Here’s a site, go use it.’” According to Anthony, insurers need to “double down their efforts to motivate consumers to choose high-value, low-priced services.”