I recently had hip replacement surgery at OPR. The surgeon whom I really liked, only performs surgeries there. Based on my insurance and CPT-codes, I received out-of-pocket estimates for radiology, anesthesia, lab work, surgeon fee, etc. However, when it came to the facility charges, I discovered OPR’s truly cynical efforts to obfuscate giving any meaningful pricing information. I had called OPR’s billing department for the hospitals’ facility estimate. I was told to call their Pricing and Estimates Dept. I left eight detailed voicemails with them (the Parallon Group) during a seven-week period. No call was ever returned. Every pricing page on OPR’s website contains some pretty but very empty words. There are tabs for Pay Your Bill-Price Estimates, About Our Pricing Commitment, Contact Us. The more shameless examples: “Call our toll-free number.” (there is none) “Please call us to speak with one of our specialists who will be happy to assist.” (actual text, there was no phone number) “If you would like to obtain an estimate call.” (actual text) From the Welcome to Our Patient Financial Resource Site/ Our Commitment page: “On this site you can learn more about…Contact Information to call us directly for a pricing estimate” (there is no contact information) The ONLY phone number on any of these pages is on the Contact Us section of the Pricing Estimates and Information page, which shows the following: “When you call our Service Center.” (actual sentence) At the bottom of this page is shown: HCA Midwest Administration (Business Office) 5440 W. 110th St #400 Overland Park, KS 66211 Telephone: (816) 508-4000 I drove to this office and called this phone number from the lobby. The office is not open to the public, personnel refused to see me AND it has nothing to do with billing or price estimates. They referred me back to the billing dept black hole! Really, the audacity by OPR to deceive the consumer by actually posting this “information” on their Contact Us page is truly amazing. I did find a Patient Payment Estimator tool on OPR’s website. After entering relevant insurance information, it gives a price estimate for joint replacement surgery but only for Belton Medical Center. Also, since I already had pricing information from each of the other providers for the exact CPT Code for the surgery, I only wanted the out-of-pocket estimate for the OPR facility fee, not any generic and bundled pricing. Moreover, I was only trying to get reliable estimates, not exact pricing. I spoke with representatives of OPR’s Risk Management or Patient Access Dept six times before scheduling surgery and three times even after the surgery was scheduled. They still would ONLY give me the billed amount for the facility fee. The billed amount is irrelevant. With insurance, the only pricing that matters is the contract rate for the CPT-Code. OPR patients are given the Patient Guide booklet. In the Patient Bill of Rights/Payment and Administration section on page 9, it states: (the right) “to receive, upon request, prior to treatment, a reasonable estimate of charges for medical care”. I think this statement is just grossly hollow. OPR has a link for View Our Pricing Transparency CMS Required File of Standard Charges. It lists no charges for any service at all, but instead has a raw data file of 28,004 pieces of medical equipment. How unhelpful that was! Subsequently, I found much information on the 2021 CMS Price Transparency Final Rule. This law requires hospitals (OPR) to publish clear, accessible pricing information of both gross charges and negotiated rates of all services in the hospitals’ Chargemaster, as well as 300 shoppable services they provide, in a consumer-friendly format. These must include 70 specific services required by CMS. Joint replacement surgery is one of the 70 services required by CMS to be clearly published. It would not be surprising to know that OPR is paying the paltry $300 per day (pocket change), fine for refusing to comply with the law. The healthcare consumer has a right to know a legitimate estimate of what their out-of-pocket costs should be for any of OPR’s 300 shoppable services. It seems to me that it’s bad enough that OPR refuses to publish these charges as is required by law. But to cynically post on their website misleading and obfuscating junk, essentially happy-talk in words, is just pathetic. If OPR really cared, they would do the right thing in the first place- publish the pricing information as is required by CMS and the law! So, to be actually helpful to the healthcare consumer, here are my out-of-pocket costs for hip replacement surgery at OPR and with United Health Care insurance: OPR facility: $6,309 Surgeon: $552 CT Scan/Radiology: $187 Anesthesiology: $200 Hospitalist: $41