Why is Healthcare so Expensive?

Health care seems to get more expensive every year. But it doesn't have to be that way.

In other industries that are not as highly regulated like the tech industry, prices tend to decrease and new innovations arrive all the time. In stark contrast, significant innovations in the medical industry have stagnated and prices continue to rise.

More and more pharmaceutical companies are just producing slightly different variants of previous drugs and charging a lot more for them. This contributes to high drug prices. In addition, our federal government has not been aggressive about negotiating down drug prices like other countries which supports high prices. 

But by far the biggest contributor to costs is a lack of competition or a free market in the medical industry. Due to a lack of price transparency and government regulations, prices go up and corresponding insurance costs rising significantly. In addition, government has legislated away catastrophic insurance plans and forced everyone to pay for high deductible and high priced insurance. 

Are there other options?

There are alternative lower cost options such as doctors like myself that offer much lower prices for health care. There are even hospitals such as the Surgery Center of Oklahoma that offer affordable and transparent pricing for many surgeries. 

The solution to the health care crisis is very simple. Converting health insurance back into actual insurance and having people pay their health care providers directly for most health care services would drive prices down quickly. 

It would also incentive Doctors to provide a higher quality of service which would be a win-win for everyone. 

For more information on how you can get a higher quality of service at a much more affordable price give me a call at Murdock Health.