Compliance With CMS Price Transparency Rule Improved With Penalty Increases
Medically reviewed by Drugs.com.
By Elana Gotkine HealthDay Reporter
FRIDAY, June 30, 2023 -- Compliance with the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Price Transparency Rule is positively associated with penalty increases, according to a study published online June 28 in JAMA Network Open.
Edward Kong, from Harvard Medical School in Boston, and Yunan Ji, Ph.D., from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., examined the association between financial penalties and acute care hospital compliance with the 2021 CMS Price Transparency Rule. The responses of 4,377 acute care hospitals in the United States operating in 2021 and 2022 to changes in financial penalties in the context of a federal rule requiring hospitals to disclose privately negotiated prices were examined using an instrumental variable design.
The researchers found that from 2021 to 2022, there was an increase in compliance from 70.4 to 87.7 percent, with 90.2 percent of the hospitals reporting prices in at least one year. From 2021 to 2022, there was an increase observed in noncompliance penalties, from $109,500/year to a mean of $510,976/year. In 2022, penalties were substantial, averaging 0.49, 0.53, and 1.3 percent of total hospital revenue, total hospital costs, and total employee wages, respectively. There was a significant positive association seen for compliance increases with penalty increases: a 2.9 percentage point increase in compliance was seen in association with a $500,000 increase in penalty. When controlling for observable hospital characteristics, the results were robust.
"Financial penalties may be a valuable tool for ensuring compliance with CMS policy when fines are sufficiently large, noncompliance is readily observable and well defined, and enforcement is credible," the authors write.
Disclaimer: Statistical data in medical articles provide general trends and do not pertain to individuals. Individual factors can vary greatly. Always seek personalized medical advice for individual healthcare decisions.
© 2024 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
Posted June 2023
Read this next
BMI Cutoff of 30 for Obesity May Be Too High for Middle-Aged, Older Adults
FRIDAY, May 31, 2024 -- The optimal body mass index (BMI) cutoff point appears to be 27 kg/m2 for detecting obesity in middle-aged and older adults, according to a study presented...
Emergency Inguinal Hernia Surgery Rates Increased With Lower Country Income
FRIDAY, May 31, 2024 -- For patients undergoing inguinal hernia surgery, emergency surgery rates increase from high- to low-income countries, according to a study published online...
Maternal Serum Alpha-Fetoprotein Levels Higher in Black Than White Women
FRIDAY, May 31, 2024 -- Maternal serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) levels are higher in Black than White pregnant women, supporting the use of accounting for these differences in...
More news resources
- FDA Medwatch Drug Alerts
- Daily MedNews
- News for Health Professionals
- New Drug Approvals
- New Drug Applications
- Drug Shortages
- Clinical Trial Results
- Generic Drug Approvals
Subscribe to our newsletter
Whatever your topic of interest, subscribe to our newsletters to get the best of Drugs.com in your inbox.