Northside Hospital fined more than $1M over unclear health care prices

ATLANTA — Northside Hospital just became the first hospital in the country to be fined over transparent health care price information.

The fine surrounds a rule that requires hospitals to post the prices of services on their websites. That rule just went into effect last year.

The rule is intended to allow patients to shop and plan for the costs of medical care.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which oversees that rule, said the hospital did not have a “machine-readable” list of prices.

That means the data could be read by a computer.

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It also said Northside Hospital Atlanta did not have a searchable list for consumers in a prominent manner that clearly identified the location of the hospital concerned.

It claimed it could not find consumer-friendly list of standard charges at Northside Hospital Cherokee.

In total, the hospital was fined more than $1 million for the violations.

CMS said it notifies hospitals of violations and gives them time to fix issues before it issues fines.

Channel 2 Action News has contacted Northside Hospital for a response to the fine, but so far, we have not heard back.

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