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HEmanZ a day ago

You can search for more reports, because they do vary based on methodology. But the median hospital in the US makes between -1% (yes, negative, they lose money, because a huge percentage are non profits) and 4% depending on the source.

When the hospital charges you $37 for an aspirin, that singular pill might have a crazy profit margin in isolation. But your entire treatment could very well be losing the hospital money.

In my own anecdotal experience, the one hospital I know enough details about to comment on specifically, had something like 85% of patients costing the hospital more money than the hospital made. It was entirely funded by the relatively small number of people who had the “right” insurance and had the “right” procedures done.

Eg Kaufman: https://www.vizient.com/insights/reports/national-hospital-f...

jjav 17 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It is a system where all prices and costs are so far detached from reality for multiple reasons, that looking at any current profit margins is not going to be very realistic either.

Really need to step back and start from first principles.

When I go to urgent care I get 15 minutes with a doctor who on average makes about $300K and maybe another 15 minutes with a nurse assistant who might be making $100K (or less). So that is less than $50 in doctor+nurse salary. Of course there are then all the overhead of rent, utilities, etc, etc but those are not so different from any other business in the same strip mall. So let's say total cost for my visit is maybe $100. But I'm charged $500-$600 for the visit. Someone is pocketing a lot of money and it is not the doctor nor the nurse.

We could do the same exercise for surgery, the costs for surgeons and anestethicians is much higher, but you'll be hard pressed to find any realistic scenario where the cost of a two hour surgery is more than $100K.

shibapuppie 14 hours ago | parent [-]

How much does insurance, legal representation, a department to argue with insurers, etc cost the hospital?

tptacek 3 hours ago | parent [-]

About 8.5% of revenue. This is not a poorly-studied number.

threethirtytwo 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's the salaries. That's where all the money is going. So that 37$ asperin, the profits... most of it is going to pay salaries. Not just of the doctors but administrators and all that.

joquarky 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not buying any of this when the world is now full of dark patterns¹ and the ultimate result is that people in charge keep getting richer, faster.

¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting

s1artibartfast 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

many hospitals are run by non-profits or the government (e.g. universities)

mitchdoogle 4 hours ago | parent [-]

How do the salaries of administrators at such hospitals compare to for profit hospitals? How do they compare to non-medical institutions of similar size? Without a lot more information, your statement doesn't mean anything.

s1artibartfast 2 hours ago | parent [-]

My point was that if it is all Hollywood accounting to scam consumers, then the nonprofits and government hospitals are doing the same thing.

Administrator pay scale is completely irrelevant to the point

93po 19 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

This is immediately what came to mind to me. You can be extremely profitable but paying out tens of billions in dividends, or a million other things.

loeg 16 hours ago | parent [-]

Dividends aren't a Loss.

jasonlotito a day ago | parent | prev [-]

fyi: Your link returns a 404 for me.

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