What do you think about Trump’s executive order to look at transparency in drug pricing?

I love it. You cant enforce rules that dont exist. First step is this.

Love NPR as source btw, really do.

Great question. I’ll get back to you when I hear it discussed in the field. I’m sure there will be major unintended consequences but, at face value, I think it sounds good.

What does it matter if I know what it costs if it’s still unaffordable? If I know a procedure costs $1,210 vs. $1,500 dollars all it means is I still can’t afford it. And it’s not like most health insurance just lets you shop around for doctors and hospitals. And even if you could, you’d have to change your primary caregiver and corresponding hospital and clinic associations. That takes at least a month. By then you could be dead.

I’d have to know more about the consequences before determining my opinion.

I agree with the above. However this crossed my mind when I had a custom brace made for my arm. I asked how much it would cost. They had no answer.
I watched them make it. I estimated it took less than $5.00 worth of plastic and Velcro, and 15 minutes of tech work… $30 for labor? After I got the bill I REALLY tracked those numbers down and I was remarkably spot on with my numbers.
The bill was over $600! Out of my pocket!! I learned there is NOTHING controlling pricing of the medical industry. I would have refused it had I known it would be more than $100. $600.00. How absurd.

And when patients start refusing services, and Trump and Cronies start losing money, watch the transparency disappear. (Aha ha! “Transparency disappear!” Ha ha!)

Meaningless until there are details. Right now he is directing an agency to study something. Whoop-dee-shit! He could have done that on the phone instead of with a proclamation.

This was staged for TV – there is zero substance to this. It is a cynical political act, that’s all.

@tinyfaery I don’t know exactly where this Trump initiative will go, but I’ll give you some examples of why it’s good to have transparency in pricing.

My husbands CT scans were $750 self pay and over $2,000 through insurance, where I had to pay $1,200. If I do the cheaper self-pay it won’t go towards my deductible, but it’s much cheaper. I only knew self-pay was less because I asked. I later found out a woman I knew worked in a diagnostic center, she said they aren’t allowed to let patients know the self-pay prices if they don’t ask. An MRI could be $3,500 with insurance and $1,100 self-pay.

My drug for my ectopic pregnancy was $450 on insurance, and $45 self-pay.

How many people are paying $30 for their prescription and don’t know it’s costing insurance $200 and last month it was only $100.

The more the public has the information the more public pressure on pricing.

Think about the epi-pen scandal and the HIV drugs. There is a ton of that type of thing going on in medical and prescription pricing.

Right now medical centers and doctors lie by omisión. They don’t tell you how much it’s going to cost, you just receive a bill.

I just had blood work done today, I assume it will be $75 like usual with my insurance, but they could try to charge me anything.

Meaningless without real action to follow it up. Executive orders aren’t law, and most do little more than instruct some agency under the President’s purview to “hey, take a look at this”.

It is probably just political posturing. But I applaud the effort, nonetheless. I just hope that Trump is as hard on this, as other situations.

I’m glad we haven’t gone to war with Iran, too…
I was very worried that he would be a war monger. So far, that isn’t the case. I give him credit for his restraint, when he could probably just fuck Iran up. Our naval presence in the area, is formidable. I hate Trump. But at least he isn’t just bombing every one.

He’s a train wreck. But he’s getting some things right. I think…

At this point, Trump has more respect from me. We’ll see if he keeps his word. This pharmaceutical thing, is another step in the right direction. If he wants to take our health care, at least he’s balancing it out, some…

I still think that the ACA, was a better idea, but at least he’s doing SOMETHING about it.

I’d love for Trump to prove me wrong, in my assessment of him. He is FAR from perfect, but these are the types of things that I would like to see.

He may be able to bully the pharmaceutical companies, into some positive changes…

I’m not counting my eggs, before they’re hatched though. God speed Mr. Trump….

Much ado about nothing. Nothing will come of it.

Did anyone hear about this executive order on the TV? Which channel? I don’t watch the political channels a ton, but I didn’t hear it there. I usually watch MSNBC.

I think this should have been talked about more than it seemed to be by the media. The country lists healthcare as a priority in most polls being taken. Put some public pressure to know the deadlines for the analysis they will be doing and to see the results. I didn’t see a deadline in the article, maybe I missed it.

I hope he looks at what insurance companies are charging/profiting also.

I don’t agree with what Trump has said he wants to do, which is throw healthcare out to the free market, we already know there is no real and honest free market in healthcare, but if he gets honest data, it can be used by other presidents and governors.

Get back to me when something actually gets done. Sounds like Trump’s grand infrastructure plan.

It doesn’t bring drug prices down by a single brass cent and probably never will.

I think it is a start towards shining a light on the murky world of Big Pharma.

That is definately something he does NOT want to happen @seawulf575.

@Dutchess_lll Id he definitely did NOT want that to happen, he wouldn’t have written the EO. It might be time to apply some common sense instead of TDS.

How about he either a) didn’t understand what “transparacy” means or b) did it to look good after being told there is no way it will happen.
I don’t get why you give that mentally challenged, old, demented male credit for brains he does not have.
He told an auditorium of teenagers that the Constitution gives him the right to do anything he wants! After 3 years of being blocked and overturned he tells them that drivel! And expects them to believe it!

@Dutchess Your honest opinion is that Trump hasnt done one good thing? (no snark intended, legit curiousity)

Imagine all the lives changed if Big Pharma was limited. Cant help but hope.

If trump does anything good you can bet that his handlers (who also stand to gain) have told him he will make a money profit off it.
They all stand to lose money if Big Pharma is exposed so it won’t happen.

I found this and this interesting.

@Cupcake Thanks!

For the most part I think hospitals want to protect their business, and transparency about pricing out in the community hurts the hospital’s ability to charge astronomical prices. One thing I do worry about, considering the general mantra of republicans regarding the poor, is i do worry that this sort of investigation will outline that some of the high price is covering people who don’t pay.

The medical industry notoriously tries to hold information away from the patient/consumer. About 5 years ago there finally was a federal law passed that we consumers could see our test results directly from the lab. Why did doctors think patients didn’t have a right to that information? Sure they will say patients don’t know what to do with the information, but mostly I think doctors want you to have to come back for results and PAY for another visit.

I don’t think Trump’s investigation is only about hospital pricing, but I might be wrong. It’s not just hospitals obviously that need investigating, it’s doctors, dx centers, pharmacy, etc.

One of the articles talked about shifting the burden to the pt to evaluate pricing. The government and insurers seem to be doing little to nothing about pricing, so why not the consumer at this point? The problem is, it’s saying the transparency would be only what the pt will actually be paying, not what will be billed. Although, actually, my problem right now is the doctor sees BCBS on my chart and charges me a fortune. Then I say, “I pay everything, my deductible is $15k,” and sometimes they cut my bill (recode it I guess). It’s such a farce. It’s truly disgusting. I guess I’m supposed to be happy they cut my bill, but for the most part I think they are gouging BCBS (wanting to) which in the end gouges everyone paying premiums to them, which is me, everyone with BCBS, and the government that is subsidizing BCBS in the ACÁ marketplace, which is all taxpayers.

Some doctors are being squeezed, like GP and pediatrician on average aren’t making a ton of money, but plenty are, or the company they work for is.

People say they don’t want the government running healthcare, but when big conglomerates are running it it’s very similar in terms of bureaucracy, and corporations just look at the money in the end.

@JLeslie “Sure they will say patients don’t know what to do with the information, but mostly I think doctors want you to have to come back for results and PAY for another visit.”

Or maybe, just maybe, patients actually don’t understand the information they’re looking at. I sure as hell don’t know how to read an x-ray or a CT scan. But, unlike many other, I accept that I actually don’t know more than the doctor.

Lots of hospitals lose money, by treating uninsured people. My understanding is that they charge as much as three times, for an uninsured person, to try to make up the difference.

@Darth_Algar Women do know a negative Pap smear means they are ok, and most diabetics know glucose readings and A1C and everyone can see on a blood test if they are in normal range or not.

Being able to see test results does not stop the doctors obligation to review the results and call notify the patient if there is something worrisome. All the immediate access gives to patients is the convenience of seeing their results sooner (not waiting for a doctor’s call) it lets them see results if the doctor has a policy of not calling if everything is normal (this varies a lot, some doctors call to say everything is ok, some don’t bother) and if the doctor fucks up it’s a safety. Like my doctor didn’t call me to tell me my cholesterol was 330, not that my kidney function was below normal. They want to say I would have found out at my next appointment, but to me that’s incompetence. What if I need to postpone my appointment, what if my next appointment isn’t soon enough? What if everything is normal, then why am I (and taxpayers) paying for a follow up appointment? Unless there is a very specific condition being treated that needs discussion even with normal results.

If your CT scan is normal you need to see the doctor for that? Maybe you do if you’re going to try another treatment based on the findings, but when you saw the doctor the first time that could be discussed.

I don’t think I know more than doctors, but I know a lot about my own conditions that I’ve had a long time, just like diabetics can monitor a lot of things on their own. Initially, I needed more appointment with my thyroid for instance, now after 15 years I need the blood test, I know what to do based on the blood test. I do need to get checked once a year, that I have no problem with. Physically looked at. If a test result shows a new problem then yes of course I want to see the doctor to discuss it and course of action.

Maybe you are overall young and healthy and in a location where doctors aren’t trying to get you to come back even for normal results. Where I live the majority of the people are on Medicare and the doctor will have you come every two months because Medicare will cover it. That’s your tax money. What if the patient has something knew on their test results that needs to be addressed before 2 months? The doctor I was seeing wasn’t calling me right away. I think that horrible. Don’t assume your doctors are in top of everything. Know your numbers. Even great doctors and great staff can male mistakes, they are human.

@JLeslie We do all that online now. Once a year visit with doc, labs, etc…then it’s all internet-based communication as needed, even for new scripts. I love it. From what I hear, it’s the new trend, getting even office visits online.

@JLeslie “Maybe you are overall young and healthy and in a location where doctors aren’t trying to get you to come back even for normal results.”

I’m 42, was born with a heart defect (that still, to this day, significantly effects my day-to-day life) and have spent my whole life dealing with doctors. Never once had I had a doctor call me back in for an “all’s good” or for routine results, they do that with a simple phone call. Never have I had a doctor call me back to their office unless there was something of some concern that needed to discussed more thoroughly, face-to-face.

I had one doctor in all these years pull that shit on me, giving me bullshit reasons for me to come in. He was a new to me doc so I dropped him. That’s the only doctor who has ever done that in all my life.

It’s rampant where I live now. I didn’t have that problem in TN. In TN I did have the problem of getting my results from certain doctors in a timely manner, this was before the federal law changed. Before the federal law changed, some states already had the law and some didn’t.