Show HN: I mapped US medical prices. Save thousands by driving a few miles
This is cute, but it is based on a flawed premise.  There are not "prices" for medical procedures and even the providers don't know what they are going to charge.  Anecdata: when my wife was pregnant I asked the hospital what are the basic charges for normal obstetric delivery, since we were paying out of pocket.  I got a reply in writing that it was $20k, a suspiciously round number without itemization.  The baby comes and there are no complications and no anesthetic and the attending physician never even showed up for some reason.  So it was in every way the cheapest possible way to have a baby short of squatting over a blanket.<p>Needless to say that this American hospital would not even have admitted us without a certified check in advance, so we had spotted them the $20k.  Over the next six weeks I get literally dozens of bills.  I get a bill from the attending obstetrician who wasn't even present.  I get bills for anesthesia that wasn't administered.  I get bills in total of over $31k. I was uninsured but I'm not some chump, so my attorney sent these people sternly worded letters and we held the line at $20k which I think anyone would agree is already a ridiculous price in the first place.<p>Point is, nobody in this system has any idea what the price of anything is.  There's no rate card.  It's a collective emergent phenomenon that prints invoices.  Nothing more.