• USA wastes more on health care bureaucracy than it would cost to provide health care to all of the uninsured

  • The U.S. wastes more on health care bureaucracy than it would cost to provide health care to all of the uninsured. Administrative expenses will consume at least $399.4 billion out of total health expenditures of $1,660.5 billion in 2003. Streamlining administrative overhead to Canadian levels would save approximately $286.0 billion in 2003, $6,940 for each of the 41.2 million Americans who were uninsured as of 2001. This is substantially more than would be needed to provide full insurance coverage.

  • New Mexico, with 373,000 uninsured, could save $1.500 billion on health bureaucracy ($4,022 per uninsured resident).

  • In 1969 administrative personnel accounted for 18.2% of the health care work force in the U.S. By 1999 administration’s share had risen to 27.3% of total employees – a 50% increase. This figure excludes the 926,000 employees in life/health insurance firms, and 724,000 employed in insurance brokerages. Overall, at least 31.0% of health spending was devoted to administration in the U.S. in 1999.

  • In contrast, administration’s share of health employment in Canada (where a national health program has been in place since 1971) grew only 17% between 1971 and 1986, and has remained virtually unchanged since 1986. In 1996 administrative workers accounted for 19.1% of health employees vs. 27.3% in the late 1990s in the U.S. (both of these figure exclude health insurance company workers, who are far more numerous in the U.S. Administration consumed 16.7% of Canadian health spending in 1999.

  • The huge gap in administrative costs between the U.S. and Canada arises from their differing mechanisms of paying for health care. While Canada has a single insurance plan, or "single-payer", in each province that pays the bills for everyone, the U.S. has a complex and fragmented payment structure built around thousands of different insurance plans, each with its own regulations on coverage, eligibility, and documentation.

  • The participation of private insurers raises administrative costs. The small private insurance sectors in Australia, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands all have high overheads: 15.8%, 13.2%, 20.4% and 10.4% respectively, far higher than the 1% to 4% overhead of public insurance programs.

  • Functions essential to private insurance but absent in public programs – e.g. underwriting, marketing, and corporate services – account for about two-thirds of private insurers’ overhead. In addition, private insurers have incentives to erect administrative hurdles – by complicating and stalling payment they can hold premiums longer, boosting their interest income. Such hurdles also discourage some patients and providers from pursuing claims.

  • A fragmented payment structure is intrinsically more expensive than a single payer system. For insurers, it means the duplication of claims processing facilities and reduced insured-group size, which increases overhead.

  • Fragmentation also raises costs for providers who deal with multitudes of different insurance plans – at least 755 in Seattle alone. This means providers must determine each patient’s insurance coverage and eligibility for a particular service, and keep track of varying co-payments, referral networks, approval requirements and formularies. In contrast, Canadian physicians send virtually all bills to a single insurer using a simple billing form or computer program, and may refer patients to any colleague or hospital.

  • If the states were as efficient at administering health care as the Canadian provinces, they would save more than enough to fund universal coverage, without any increase in total health spending.

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• Health Care Bureaucracy Wastes Billions

  • a new report shows that cutting bureaucratic waste in the U.S. health care system by implementing a governmentrun, single payer program would free up enough money to provide health coverage to uninsured Americans as well as drug coverage for seniors.

  • The U.S. health care bureaucracy consumes at least $399.4 billion annually in administrative costs, but national health insurance could save about $286 billion in these costs  equivalent to $6,940 for each of the 41.2 million Americans who were uninsured as of 2001, according to a report published in August by Public Citizen and Harvard Medical School researchers.

  • Instead of cutting Medicaid and other vital services, officials could expand services by freeing up the $286 billion a year wasted on administrative expenses.

  • They found that bureaucracy accounted for at least 31 percent of the total U.S. health spending in 1999 compared to 16.7 percent in Canada. Moreover, the study showed that administration has grown much faster in the United States than in Canada.

  • Three factors contribute to higher U.S. administrative costs, the researchers found. Private insurers have high overhead in both countries but play a much bigger role in the United States.

  • Also, the United States has a fragmented payment system that drives up administrative costs. Doctors and hospitals deal with hundreds of different insurance plans (at least 755 in Seattle alone), each with different coverage and payment rules. By contrast, Canadian doctors bill a single insurance plan, using a single simple form, and hospitals receive a lump sum budget similar to how a fire department is paid in the United States.

  • Finally, the drive among U.S. hospitals and insurers to make health care a profitable business venture has expanded bureaucracy.

  • “Only national health insurance can squeeze the bureaucratic waste out of the health care system and use the money to give patients the care they need,” said Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard and coauthor of Public Citizen’s report.

  • The United States already spends enough money to provide every American with superb medical care 42 percent more than in Switzerland, which has the world’s second most expensive health care system, and 83 percent more than in Canada.

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• Inefficient Health Care Bureaucracy Costs Physicians $27 Billion Per Year | The National Law Review

  • The researchers also found that nurses and physicians staff spend nearly 21 hours per week on administrative duties. Those in Canada spend just 2.5 hours.
  • A new study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit research group that tracks employer-sponsored health insurance on a yearly basis, shows that the average annual premium for family coverage through an employer reached $15,073 in 2011, an increase of 9 percent over the previous year.
  • the cost of family coverage has about doubled since 2001, when premiums averaged $7,061, compared with a 34 percent gain in wages over the same period.
  • Here is a link to the full study.

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• In U.S., Cost, Bureaucracy Top Healthcare Reform Concerns

  • Americans who favor the healthcare legislation are most concerned about the cost, while those who oppose the legislation are most concerned about bureaucracy.

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• Study Calls U.S. Health Care Bureaucracy Costs Unwieldy – NurseZone

  • the U.S. system offers higher quality and more choice in health care, and that the system is more complex in part because of government involvement.

  • “The striking thing is the huge amount of money we waste at this point on bureaucratic nonsense,” Himmelstein said. “We could have had Cadillac coverage for everyone in the United States if we were willing to cut down on the bureaucracy.”

  • The per capita cost in the United States was $1,059, compared to $307 in Canada, according to the study.

  • that translates into is the huge amount of paperwork that people are burdened with who are trying to take care of patients,”

  • The study found that health care bureaucracy cost Americans $294.3 billion in 1999, and that bureaucracy accounted for at least 31 percent of total U.S. health spending, compared to 16.7 percent in Canada, where health care is funded by the government.

  • The United States spends more than three times as much on health care administration per capita as Canada, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine

  • The per capita cost in the United States was $1,059, compared to $307 in Canada, according to the study.

  • The per capita cost in the United States was $1,059, compared to $307 in Canada, according to the study.

  • The per capita cost in the United States was $1,059, compared to $307 in Canada, according to the study.

  • that translates into is the huge amount of paperwork that people are burdened with who are trying to take care of patients

  • The study found that health care bureaucracy cost Americans $294.3 billion in 1999, and that bureaucracy accounted for at least 31 percent of total U.S. health spending, compared to 16.7 percent in Canada, where health care is funded by the government.

  • The United States spends more than three times as much on health care administration per capita as Canada, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine

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