Price Transparency
The information provided below is a comprehensive list of charges for each inpatient and outpatient service or item provided by a hospital, also known as a chargemaster. It is not a helpful tool for patients to comparison shop between hospitals or to estimate what health care services are going to cost them out of their own pocket. Medicare, Medicaid and insurance companies all pay hospitals far below these charges.
A new tool that is more helpful is our Price Transparency Estimator. The information provided is an estimate, not a guarantee of final billed charges. Estimates are based on average charges and may vary based on patient health condition, unknown circumstances or complications, final diagnosis and recommended treatment ordered by your physician. Patients with insurance should also contact their health benefits administrator for the most accurate information regarding covered benefits, deductible and co-payment amounts. Professional fees, such as physician, radiologist, pathologist not included in this estimate.
For more information about the cost of your care, please contact our patient financial services staff at 660.826.8833.
Focus On Hospitals
For a better comparison of the total charges for Inpatient and Emergency Room charges, please visit focusonhospitals.com. There you can select any hospital and compare the most common services for Inpatient and Emergency Room treatment.
Pricing
Focus on Hospitals allows health care consumers to compare information about the most common inpatient medical procedures and emergency department services at Missouri hospitals. Hospital pricing and medical billing can be complicated. Users can find hospital charges for a variety of medical services, but most health care consumers will never pay these rates. Insurance companies, Medicare and Medicaid all pay hospitals at rates far below these charges. Those actual amounts vary from one case to the next.
Community
Hospitals make significant investments in their communities — the value they provide to their communities is much broader than the delivery of health care services. They provide a strong economic foundation through investments in employees, buildings and equipment.
They also provide benefits to their communities, including charity care and absorbing bad debt, helping educate and train the health care workforce, offering free clinic services, and donating to local causes. Information provided by Focus on Hospitals shows the investments hospitals make to improve the health of individuals and communities, and it underscores the importance of hospitals as an economic engine — locally, regionally and statewide. Community investment numbers reflect 2016 data.
Quality Data
The quality measures were selected based on agreement from Missouri providers and national organizations and experts. The measures chosen represent the primary goal of quality care — do no harm. Infections, falls and unnecessary hospitalization or unplanned readmission are areas hospitals strive to improve.
The data used for the quality data measures is patient hospital discharge data. This source was used to ensure consistent data sources from all providers. However, this data source is not perfect. It is recognized that other data sources and calculations could provide more accurate rates, at the hospital level. In particular, this source and method of calculation for infection rates may result in higher rates when calculated with more exact and sensitive data sources. These measures do not fully explain the level of quality care provided in a hospital. If you have questions, please talk to your care provider.
Please note some hospitals do not treat patients with these conditions and therefore may not have information displayed in some categories. Similarly, if there are not enough cases for a particular measure, the data can be misleading. Therefore, harm and infection information will only be shown if there are at least 25 cases per 12-month reporting period. Readmission information will be displayed if a hospital has at least 25 cases in the three-year reporting period. If a hospital does not have the minimum amount of cases required, their data will not be displayed. In addition, only acute care hospitals are required to submit infection data to the National Healthcare Surveillance Network. Hospitals that are not required to submit will not have data displayed.
Because different patient populations have different health outcomes, simply comparing the number or percentage of some quality measures will not provide an accurate comparison. To make a more accurate comparison, some measures are “adjusted.” This is a common statistical step so that comparison may be similar. However, even adjusting the data cannot guarantee an identical comparison of “apples to apples.” Read the methodology report for risk adjustment for sociodemographic status in 30-day hospital readmissions.
Measures calculated from time periods including data on or after October 1, 2015 display rates using provisional methodology. This methodology has been tested at the state level, however, has not been nationally tested or approved.