Report: Arizona hospitals not in full compliance with pricing transparency laws

 The federal government is beginning to take action against hospitals not complying with pricing transparency laws. This month, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued two civil penalties to hospitals in Georgia, totaling more than a million dollars, for non-compliance, and the agency says it will continue to investigate hospitals around the country to make sure consumers have all the information they are entitled to.

"We support price transparency and empowering patients to understand their health care costs. We have offered price estimates to patients in advance of scheduled care for many years, and we will continue to do so going forward. Our first priority related to price transparency requirements was to expand our online tools to help patients estimate their out-of-pocket costs for hospital services based on their specific insurance situation. These enhanced online resources for patients have been published on our hospital websites. We are now working as quickly as possible to fully comply with the complex regulatory requirements to publish our negotiated rates with health plans. In addition to compiling information from our many health plan contracts across our health system, we are analyzing significant amounts of data to ensure the information we publish appropriately represents our negotiated rates in a way that is understandable and complies with the federal rule. We expect to begin posting this information over the next several months."

It's unclear if any Arizona hospitals have received warning letters from CMS or are currently being evaluated by the agency for compliance with the federal pricing transparency requirements. A spokesperson for CMS said specifics surrounding compliance would not be publicly available unless a civil penalty is issued.