Avoiding the High Cost of Hospitals

ONE reason for the rapid increase in medical costs is expensive, lengthy and sometimes unnecessary hospital stays. But you have several new ways to avoid the high price of hospitals. In nearly half of all surgical operations, patients now can return home the same day. Today, surgical lasers have reduced hazardous bleeding, and lighter anesthetics eliminate the hours of grogginess and nausea. As a result, many routine procedures such as hernia repair and cataract removal are being done safely, efficiently and economically outside of hospitals.

These same day operations are performed at hospital affiliated clinics, as well as at independent surgical centers and even in doctors' offices. The doctors' fees are usually the same wherever an operation is performed, but other costs are 40% to 60% less than for a similar operation in a hospital. That's because the overhead in a clinic or office is lower and there are no room charges.

Some emergency room treatment and many recuperative services also don't need the vast and vastly expensive resources of a fully equipped hospital. So entrepreneurs and hospitals have begun setting up independent emergency rooms. About 6,000 of them now exist across the country. They're staffed mainly by physicians specializing in emergency medicine or family practice. Some 100 million patients visited these centers in 2005. True, an emergency center is no place to go with a serious illness or injury. But for minor burns, sprains, cuts and colds, it can deliver faster, more convenient and often less expensive care.

Private business people also are offering home care services that can be priced lower than the same care in a hospital. Some 11,000 agencies now provide home care, and 5,800 of them are Medicare approved. They send out nurses, homemakers and even companions to people who are confined at home but don't need hospitalization.

So, if you are ever headed toward a hospital, you might pause a moment to consider your growing ranges of alternatives.