The society of the United States is based on Western Culture. American society and its culture is more fragmented. One of the reasons for their excessive spending could be their diverse nature. Keeping the high insurance premiums and other out-of-pocket expenses in consideration, it is no surprise that Americans have to spend a huge amount of money on Healthcare.
Reasons for Healthcare cost inflation
The healthcare costs in the US have drastically increased in the past several years. According to a Mercer survey issued on Thursday, 43% of large firms believe healthcare costs would be higher than anticipated for the upcoming year. The journal of the American Association threw light on five key factors that are responsible for the rise in costs of healthcare. These factors include increasing population,increasing number of senior citizens,prevalence of diseases, medical service utilization and increasing service prices.
While the American lifestyle and their living expenses are responsible for these increasing prices, the Government has taken equal participation in it. The Government can have an impact on healthcare expenses in several ways. The various ways might include high charges on taxes, increase in costs of healthcare services and introduction of new regulations.
Malpractice insurance by doctors is a global issue. Most patients fall prey to these practices but for those who do realize their rights and are aware of the CPT codes, rise of lawsuits is the reason for their expenses. Filing a lawsuit can dig hole in anyone’s pocket. Hence when it comes to Healthcare facilities, the lawsuits can be even more expensive. It is commonly found from reports that medical lawsuits cost twice more than a normal one.
Healthcare costs can be managed by insurance if a patient has ideas about filing claims. Whereas, if the insurance plans are limited from the beginning, it leaves the patients with a choice of nothing but to pay for highly expensive services provided by the Healthcare Organizations.Over 54% of people get health insurance from their workplace.This also reduces the competition and ends up resulting in higher pricing.
Increased utilization of hospital-based outpatient departments, home care, professional nursing facilities, etc add up to 7-10% annual growth in healthcare expenses between 2022 and 2025.Normally patients neglect their health or end up having fatal diseases which makes them an easy target for healthcare facilities to smooch money in the name of professional nursing facilities or extra special services.
Inception of National programs like Medicare and Medicaid are also responsible for the sudden increase in prices of healthcare services. The year 2020 which saw a deadly pandemic like Covid-19 is also in the queue for reasons included in Healthcare Inflation.
