Contributor

Governor Ron DeSantis today visited Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood to announce multiple proposals to increase healthcare pricing transparency in Florida. These proposals will empower patients, decrease costs and improve the quality of the state’s healthcare system.

“It is more important than ever for people to know exactly what they are paying for as healthcare costs continue to rise,” said Governor DeSantis. “These proposals will greatly increase healthcare pricing transparency and restore power to the patients.”

Photo Credit: Memorial Healthcare System

At today’s event, Governor DeSantis announced his support for the recently proposed “Patient Savings Act” by Representative Paul Renner and Senator Manny Diaz. This legislation allows insurance providers to establish a patient savings program that incentivizes patients to shop for more affordable services by providing them a portion of the savings for choosing the lower-cost option.

The Governor also directed Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) Secretary Mary Mayhew to expedite the implementation and promotion of Florida’s healthcare transparency portals: Florida Health Finder and Florida Health Price Finder. Florida Health Finder is a tool to find information on facility quality while Florida Health Price Finder provides healthcare pricing averages and ranges at the state and local levels.

Finally, Governor DeSantis is working to ensure that state employees are aware of the state’s current shared savings program. He is directing Secretary Jonathan Satter and the Department of Management Services (DMS) to undertake several marketing initiatives to adequately educate new and current employees on what is available to them. This includes a shoppable healthcare transparency tool and a bundled services benefit that the DMS Division of State Group Insurance began offering this year.