Medical Insurance Cost Trends
Posted on Thu, Sep 24, 2009
The escalating cost of health insurance is a concern for everyone, to solve this problem we need to know what are the major contributors to this problem. In 2007 National healthcare spending reached $2.2 trillion
This is a breakdown of hospital medical services and does not include professional services, which would be additional charges.
- The average cost of a day in a hospital is over $9000
- Care for a burst appendix is over $45,000
- Knee ligament surgery is over $45,000
- A yearly supply of Lipitor is over $1,400
- An average emergency room visit is over $2,000
In 2007, PricewaterhouseCoopers completed a study to ascertain what factors where pushing medical cost up. The study reported that out of every medical insurance premium dollar $0.87 was spent on medical services, drugs, medical equipment and other medical products. Hospitals and doctors combined received more than two thirds of every medical insurance premium dollar.
Out of every premium dollar:
- Doctors received 33%
- Hospitals received 20%
- Outpatient services received 15%
- Prescription drugs cost 14%
- Insurance company's' retained 13% for administration costs, marketing, taxes, compliance and profit
- Other medical services 5%
This clearly indicates that healthcare reform will fail unless the government has more of a focus on reducing healthcare costs, rather than health insurance reform.