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Abstract

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Payer-driven healthcare price transparency holds promise for enhancing competition and facilitating informed decision-making across the healthcare system. However, multiple barriers—including inconsistent data formats, incomplete coverage of services (particularly drugs and volumes), and a lack of clarity regarding data sources—are limiting its usability. In response, this article outlines five key recommendations to improve the practical utility of transparency data in real-world settings:

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1. Deliver data in a relational structure to enable easier sorting, querying, and integration with other datasets.
2. Report data provenance and structure (i.e., data location and source context) to enhance interpretability and trust.
3. Include drug price data within transparency disclosures, recognizing pharmaceuticals as a critical component of total healthcare costs.
4. Incorporate volume data, which provides context for price variations and helps assess whether rates reflect typical or outlier use.
5. Report negotiated rates, not just list prices, so that transparency reflects the actual costs paid by payers and consumers.
   These recommendations, born out of practical experience, aim to unlock the full potential of price transparency by making data more accessible, actionable, and meaningful for policymakers, researchers, providers, employers, and patients alike."

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Full Article: https://www.healthaffairs.org/content/forefront/improving-price-transparency-data-recommendations-practice

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