Discussion postHealth care costs

Healthcare industry do to restore public confidence DQ

Two questions, and the first is empirical. Whether the public view is accurate has an answer in the spending data, and the confidence question depends on which way that answer goes.

Editorial process

Last reviewed · August 25, 2026

Written by

Maren Caldwell

MSN, RN, CNE

Medical-surgical nursing, pharmacology and NCLEX preparation

Reviewed by

Dr. Tessa Redmond

DNP, RN, CNE

Evidence-based practice and clinical education

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Interpret the task
Assignment instructions
Deliverables
Proposed outline
Research plan
Reference shortlist
Final review

The first question is empirical, so answer it that way

Is this view accurate is a question with data behind it, and skipping to the confidence half concedes the interesting part. The United States spends far more per person on health care than comparable countries without correspondingly better population outcomes, so on the aggregate the public perception is broadly right. But the prompt attributes the perception to a specific behaviour, refusal to discount premiums or charges, and that is where the picture gets more complicated and more interesting. Chargemaster prices are not what most payers actually pay, negotiated commercial rates are frequently confidential, and the patients most likely to face the undiscounted price are the uninsured and the out-of-network, which is to say the people least able to absorb it. So the perception is accurate in aggregate and mis-specified in mechanism. That is a useful sentence to reach early, because it decides which remedies the second half of the post should propose.

That distinction gives the second half something to work with, because a confidence problem caused by opacity has different remedies from one caused by price level. Price transparency rules, published negotiated rates, financial assistance policies applied before collection rather than after, and a bill a patient can predict before the encounter all address the opacity, and they are within an organisation's control in a way that national spending is not. Be careful not to argue the industry only has a communication problem, though, since administrative costs and prices are genuinely higher here and a post that explains the public is merely confused will read as defensive. The strongest position acknowledges both: the level is a real problem largely set outside any single organisation, and the opacity is a real problem that individual organisations create and could stop creating. Holding both halves is what makes the post read as an assessment rather than as advocacy for one side.

Likely learning objectives

Test a public perception against spending and outcome data.
Distinguish charges from negotiated rates and from what patients pay.
Separate a price-level problem from a price-opacity problem.
Propose remedies at the level the organisation actually controls.

Assignment instructions

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Review every instruction before using the planning guidance that follows.

Despite significant pressure, some insurance companies, Healthcare organizations and physicians have refused to discount their premiums or charges. Because of this, the public and those who represent the public, such as legislators, consumer groups, and patients, have concluded that Healthcare expenses in the U.S. are outrageous. Is this view accurate? What can the Healthcare industry do to restore public confidence? Support your argument with reference to one or more articles from the Wall Street Journal or other credible Healthcare publication You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes. Healthcare industry do to restore public confidence DQ Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages. Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor. The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.

Course-wide instructions that accompany this question

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What this discussion asks for

01An answer to whether the public view of US healthcare expenses is accurate.
02Proposals for what the healthcare industry can do to restore public confidence.
03An argument supported by reference to one or more articles from the Wall Street Journal or another credible healthcare publication.