Public Access to Provider Charge Data Reporting: 50 State Comparison

A.R.S. § 36-125-.05: Hospitals must report average charge per day to the Department of Health.  Emergency departments must report charges for outpatient services to the Department.  All reports must be available to public inspection.

A.R.S. § 36-436: A new hospital or nursing facility must file a schedule of its rates and charges and rules that relate to those rates and charges with the Director of the Department of Health Services for review.  The Director must review the schedule and publish information on gross charges within 60 days from when the hospital or nursing facility files it.

A.R.S. 36-436.01: Once the Director reviews the schedule, it must be conspicuously posted in the hospital’s reception area and in the hospital’s outpatient treatment centers or nursing care institutions.  Another copy must be kept in the reception area to be available for public inspection upon request.  Licensed health care facilities classified as outpatient treatment centers and home health agencies must file a copy of the schedule with the Director before implementing those rates and charges.

Health & Safety Code § 1339.56:  Each hospital must compile a list of 25 common outpatient  and inpatient procedures and annually submit to the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development the hospital’s average charges for those procedures.  The Office must post the list of average prices on its website.  Hospitals must provide the lists above to any person who requests them.

F.S.A. § 408.05: The Agency for Health Care Administration must make available performance measures, benefit design, and premium cost data from health plans.  In addition, the Agency must publish on the Agency’s website undiscounted charges for the 150 of the most commonly performed adult and pediatric procedures.

20 ILCS 2215/4-2: The Department is also required to make available on its website a consumer guide and a hospital report card in order to educate and assist individuals in making health care decisions.  The Consumer Guide must include information on at least 30 inpatient conditions and procedures that the Department has identified as having the greatest variation in patient charges and quality of care.

K.R.S. § 216.2929: The Cabinet on Health and Family Services must make available on its website information on charges for health care services in easy to understand language that allows consumers to make comparisons between each hospital and ambulatory facility, by payer, and for other provider groups as data becomes available.

Maine Rev. Stat. § 8712: The Maine Health Data Organization is required to create a publicly accessible website that details payment information to health care facilities and providers for health care services rendered to patients in Maine.  The website must include payment information for health care services such as, imaging, preventative health, radiology, and surgical services.  The website must display prices paid by health insurance companies, third party administrators, and if permitted, government payers (such as Medicaid and Medicare).

M.G.L.A. 12C § 8: The Center for Health Information and Analysis must require acute and non-acute hospitals to file the charge book, cost data, audited financial statements, and merged billing and discharge data with the Center.  The Center must publicly report on and put on its website information on health status adjusted total medical expenses, broken down by major service category and payment methodology, relative prices, and costs.

M.G.L.A. 12C § 16: The Center for Health Information and Analysis must publish an annual report based on the information submitted  on health care provider, provider organization and private and public health care payer costs and cost trends.  The Center must compare costs data with the health care cost growth benchmark established by the health policy commission. 

M.S.A. § 62J.82: The Minnesota Hospital Association must develop a web-based system available to the public for reporting of charge information. The website must provide information that compares hospital-specific information to statewide hospital information. 

M.S.A. § 62U.04: The Commissioner must publicly report the providers' total cost, total resource use, total quality, and the results of the total care portion of the peer grouping process and information on providers' condition-specific cost, condition-specific resource use, and condition-specific quality, and the results of the condition-specific portion of the peer grouping process annually.  Before information is publicly disseminated, the Commissioner with the advisory committee must ensure the scientific and statistical reliability and validity of the results. 

M.S.A. § 144.698:  All financial reports filed by hospitals and outpatient surgical centers under this section are public information unless they contain privileged medical information.

M.S.A. § 144.699: The Commissioner of Health must encourage hospitals, outpatient surgical centers, home care providers, and other licensed health care providers to publish prices for services that are representative of those services sought by citizens of the state.

M.S.A. § 144.0506: The Commissioner of Health may post health care charges for common procedures on agency websites.

V.A.M.S. § 192.667: Under the statute, health care providers must report charge data to the Department at least annually, while hospitals must report patient abstract data and financial data annually.  The information collected by the Department shall not be made public.  However, reports and studies prepared by the Department based on this information may be public and may also identify individual health care providers.  The statute requires the Department to undertake a “reasonable number” of studies and publish information based on this data, including at least an annual consumer guide.

N.C.G.S.A. § 131E-214.4:  A statewide data processor must make available annually a report that includes the 35 most frequently reported charges of hospital and freestanding ambulatory surgical centers to the Division of Health Service Regulation of the Department of Health and Human Services. The report is a public report to be made available to the public.

Ohio Rev. Code § 3727.39: The director of health must make performance and price information submitted by hospitals publicly available on an internet website.

O.R.S. § 442.405: The Oregon Legislature has made it a statewide policy to require health care facilities to file public disclosure reports that allow private and public purchasers of health care services to make informed decisions in purchasing services.

T.C.A. § 68-1-108: Hospital claims data reported to the Commissioner under this law must remain confidential and not be made publicly available until the data is verified by the Commissioner.

T.C.A. § 68-1-119: The commissioner may not make ambulatory surgical treatment center and outpatient claims data available to the public that could identify a patient; the claims data reported to the commissioner must remain confidential and not be made publicly available until the data is processed and verified by the Commissioner. 

U.C.A. § 26-33a-106.5: The health care data committee may publish reports that compare and identify providers or data suppliers from the data that has been collected.  The committee must publish a report from the data collected that compares and identifies by name at least a majority of the health care facilities and institutions within the state.  The report must be published annually, and must contain comparisons on nationally recognized quality standards, charges, and nationally recognized patient safety standards.

VA Code Ann. § 32.1-276.5:1: In order to promote transparency of health care information for consumers to make informed decisions, the Insurance Commissioner must negotiate and contract with a nonprofit entity for annual survey of health insurance carriers. The survey must be managed by the Commissioner to ensure that aggregate information is being provided so that consumers can determine the average reimbursement rates for a particular service.  Provider, facility, or carrier specific information will not be included in the public survey.  The public survey report must be made publicly available though a website operated by the nonprofit entity.  The Commissioner and other stakeholders must work to incorporate existing quality data and guidance into the price information.  Over time, the Commissioner must take steps to display price and quality information for episodes of care consistent with national standards.

W. Va. Code § 16-5F-4:  All covered facilities and related organizations must also file with the Board, a complete schedule of the covered facility’s then current rates with costs allocated to each category of costs, a copy of reports made or filed with the federal health care financing administration, and a statement of charges and salaries for all goods and services rendered to the covered facility for the reported time period that exceeds $55,000 and a statement of charges and fees collected by the covered facility that exceeds $55,000. All such reports must be available for public inspection. 

W. Va. Code § 16-29B-25: The Board of Directors of the West Virginia Health Care Authority may carry out analyses of health care costs or the financial status of any health care provider, and may disseminate the information to the public in order to allow for informed decision making.