These days, everyone is looking for ways to save money – whether it’s a few dollars here and there at the grocery store, or a more significant savings on your car or home mortgage. Surprisingly, you can find a multitude of ways to be “thrifty” if you know how to cut out unnecessary expenses and compare costs on the necessities. But what about with health care? It seems like one of those expenses that you can’t really do anything about – except avoid it completely (which is not recommended, of course). But that’s not how Aetna feels, and they’re committed to changing that mindset.

Aetna is one of the nation’s leading health care benefits companies. They provide health insurance and valuable health care information to over 36 million Americans. Offering a wide variety of health insurance products, including medical, pharmacy, dental, behavioral health, life, and disability, they are also one of the nation’s most diversified health insurance providers. In the midst of the economic recession, Aetna decided to do something to help their policy holders. While they have previously provided some information on health care costs on their website, Aetna has expanded the service to cover additional health care professions and service areas.

Aetna has added health care cost information for eight new health care professions: audiologists, chiropractors, occupational therapists, optometrists, physical therapists, podiatrists, speech pathologists, and speech therapists. This resource is available for Aetna members through the Aetna Navigator website. The health care resources include:

• Physician-specific Price Transparency – Shows physician-specific pricing for up to 30 of the most common health care services and procedures, including routine office visits, strep testing, and X-rays

• Physician-specific Clinical Quality and Efficiency Transparency – Provides physician-specific indicators on adverse effects, such as 30-day hospital re-admit rates, overall efficiency, and volume of Aetna members treated at the specific facility.

• Medical Procedure by Facility Cost – Offers information on facility-specific costs for over 30 common medical procedures, such as maternity care, CT scan, and colonoscopy – from admission through discharge.

Aetna members can also easily compare hospitals and medical facilities through the Aetna Navigator Hospital Comparison Tool. You can compare hospitals based on the number of patients they treat annually, their rate of medical complications, mortality rates, and the average length of stay for over 150 common procedures and diagnoses. You can see the official Aetna Health Insurance press release here.

At Aetna, we believe it is important for members to continue to access the care they need, and we are committed to helping our members maximize the value of every health care dollar they spend.

-Kathy Campbell, Aetna Product Development

Surprisingly, medical costs can vary quite drastically from one facility to the next – especially if you’re willing to travel for your health care (and just as long as your health insurance plan will cover it). Domestic medical tourism has become increasingly popular over the last few years. Your health insurance plan will typically cover the cost of your travel & lodging expenses, as well as their portion of the actual medical costs. You may even have the option to travel to a different country for specific procedures – a knee replacement here in the United States can cost between $60,000 and $70,000 – but in India, the same procedure would only cost between $8,000 and $10,000 – and that includes a 15-day stay for rehabilitation! Check with your health insurance provider on their medical tourism options.

But even if you don’t want to travel, we definitely recommend that Aetna members take advantage of the health care cost tools on their website. It’s an excellent resource, and it could definitely save you some money.

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