June 21, 2019
Modern Healthcare reported on Altarum's research on health care spending trends in low-value and high-value care services. The article states that Altarum's research "...found spending growth on five low-value services decreased on average by 1.7% annually over the two-year period. By comparison, total commercial insurance spending increased by 6.6% on average over the same time frame."
Altarum senior analyst Beth Beaudin-Seiler, who contributed to the research, told Modern Healthcare that this decrease was less than expected, and that the findings show that we're seeing "...a lot more talking and analyzing about the problem [of low-value care] but now we need to move into the 'what we need to do stage.'"
"Even though overall spending growth on the low-value services decreased, some services saw increases," the article stated, including spending growth on imaging for lower back pain.
Read the full article in Modern Healthcare, and view the original research brief from Altarum, "The 'Top 5' Low- and High-Value Services: Trends in Health Care Spending Among the Privately Insured, 2014-2016."
See additional articles about this work in Managed Healthcare Executive and the American Journal of Managed Care blog.