The moment
Federal law forced the prices open. Someone has to make them readable.
Since 2021, federal hospital price-transparency rules have required every hospital in America to publish its negotiated rates. The data exists — thousands of machine-readable files, billions of rows.
Almost nobody can read them. The files are inconsistent, incomplete, and written for auditors, not patients. Employers overpay. Patients fly blind. Startups have raised hundreds of millions trying to turn this firehose into answers.
Every one of them needs the same thing first: a name patients already trust with the question.
5×
Price spread for identical procedures
within a single metro area
within a single metro area
Procedure
Hospital
Surgery center
Knee replacement
$87,000
$18,000
Hip replacement
$72,000
$21,500
Cataract surgery
$9,800
$2,400
Illustrative ranges compiled from published transparency files and industry reporting — the point is the spread, not any single figure.
