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The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a new report titled "Lack of Price Transparency May Hamper Hospitals’ Ability to Be Prudent Purchasers of Implantable Medical Devices," which found that pricing secrecy in the medical device marketplace may drive up healthcare costs for hospitals and Medicare.
HSCA President Curtis Rooney released a statement on these findings, saying that the GAO report "confirms what GPOs, hospitals, long-term care providers, and anyone on the front lines of patient care and healthcare cost containment see every day: Medical device pricing secrecy decreases competition, limits the ability of hospitals and their GPO partners to effectively negotiate for medical products and services, and artificially drives up healthcare costs, leaving hospitals, Medicare and American taxpayers to foot the bill."
Rooney commended Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) for requesting this report from the GAO, and elaborated on medical device contractual confidentiality agreements, or "gag clauses,", saying these agreements "prevent hospitals from sharing nonproprietary data and validating that they are receiving a fair price on the products they buy... As a result, some hospitals unnecessarily pay thousands of dollars more than others for high-cost medical devices such as defibrillators, stents and hip replacements."