I was concentrating on the lousy logic expressed in the article rather than specific numbers in the study.  I think my point stands, since the total cost for any appendectomy is almost certain to exceed any deductible.<p>As you point out, the real difference in costs (and the factors that actually might influence patient behavior) are the percentage of coverage after the deductible and the levels for out-of-pocket max.   As you probably noticed, these weren&#x27;t mentioned in the article.<p>I&#x27;d hope the actual paper has a better discussion of this, but it doesn&#x27;t seem to be publicly available: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nber.org&#x2F;papers&#x2F;w21632" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nber.org&#x2F;papers&#x2F;w21632</a><p>One of the authors do have some summary slides available: 
<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;eml.berkeley.edu&#x2F;~bhandel&#x2F;wp&#x2F;BCHK.pdf" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;eml.berkeley.edu&#x2F;~bhandel&#x2F;wp&#x2F;BCHK.pdf</a><p>From Slide 8, it looks like the studied group had a 10% in-network copay, with a $6,250 out-of-pocket cap.