$165 in the Office, $404 at the Hospital for the Same Mole

Same mole. Same procedure. Two prices.

MedPAC's 2024 comparison put a skin-lesion removal at about $165 total in a freestanding physician's office. In a hospital outpatient department, the same work ran $404: $97 for the professional piece and $307 through the hospital outpatient payment system.

I am not shocked. The hospital has a building to feed. The office has a room, a tray, and a doctor who finishes the visit before you leave.

What I am against is pretending those are the same product. High-deductible patients pay that facility fee themselves. Schedule the evaluation and the procedure on different days to dodge a proposed same-day cut, and the patient pays again with a second ride, a second afternoon off work, and another open slot that someone else needed.

Direct care does the small stuff in the office. Mole. Joint injection. Laceration. Posted price. One visit. No facility fee pretending to be medicine.

I am not anti-insurance. Keep a policy for the wreck. A mole is not a wreck. It is an oil change with a Band-Aid.

$165 is a price. $404 is a building.

Sources: The Rojas Report (Dutch Rojas), MedPAC June 2024 report Ch. 1: read.rojasreport.com/p/i-love-dr-oz