Health Care Charges Billing Required Disclosures

The bill imposes requirements on health care facilities, health care providers, pharmacies, and health insurers, starting January 1, 2019, to disclose information about health care charges. Specifically, section 2 of the bill enacts the 'Comprehensive Health Care Billing Transparency Act' (act), which requires health care facilities, including hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, community clinics, and physician practice groups, to:

• Publish their fee schedules or other lists of charges the facilities bill for specific health care services before applying any discounts, rebates, or other charge adjustment mechanisms;
• Include in every bill sent to a patient an itemized detail of each health care service provided, the charge for the service, how any payment or adjustment by the patient's health insurer was applied to each line item in the bill, and, for hospitals, the amount of the healthcare affordability and sustainability fee the hospital is charged; and
• In situations where an individual provides health insurance information to the facility or a provider in a facility setting, disclose whether the facility or provider participates in the individual's health insurance plan; whether the services the facility or provider will render will be covered as an in-network or out-of-network benefit; and whether the individual will receive a service from an out-of-network provider at an in-network facility.

For an individual health care provider who provides health care services at a health care facility, has a separate fee schedule for the services the provider delivers in the facility setting, and whose fees for those services are not included in the facility's published fee schedule, the provider must provide a fee schedule to the facility for posting on the facility's website.

Section 2 also prohibits a facility or provider from billing a patient or third-party payer an amount in excess of the lower of any established self-pay rate or the lowest rate negotiated with or reimbursed by any third-party payer, including the federal centers for medicare and medicaid services in the United States department of health and human services, for the particular health care services rendered to the patient if the facility or provider has failed to publish or provide its fee schedule.

Additionally, section 2 requires a pharmacy to publish a list of its retail drug prices, which is a list of the charges the pharmacy charges to an insured or uninsured person for prescription drugs it administers or dispenses, before any rebates, discounts, or other price adjustment mechanisms are applied. Section 4 specifies that failure to comply with the requirements to publish retail drug prices constitutes grounds for the state board of pharmacy to discipline a pharmacist.

Health insurers, facilities, and providers are prohibited from including any provision in a contract between the parties issued, amended, or renewed on or after January 1, 2019, that restricts the ability of a provider, facility, or health insurer to provide patients with the charge information required to be published. Section 2 also directs the state board of pharmacy to adopt rules necessary to implement the provisions of the act that are applicable to pharmacies and the executive director of the department of public health and environment to adopt any other rules necessary to implement and administer the act.

Section 3 requires health insurers to publish information about contract terms, cost-sharing arrangements, and prescription drug prices. The commissioner of insurance is directed to adopt rules to implement and administer these requirements and is authorized to use enforcement powers under current law to enforce the requirements on health insurers.
(Note: This summary applies to this bill as introduced.)