FAIR Health Hosts Webinar on Its Free, Award-Winning Consumer Resources

Webinar Commemorates 15 Years of Advancing Health Literacy and Cost Transparency

NEW YORK, April 18, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- On April 17, FAIR Health hosted a webinar entitled "Fifteen Years of Advancing Health Literacy and Cost Transparency: A Free Webinar on FAIR Health's Award-Winning Consumer Resources." This webinar offered a comprehensive review of FAIR Health's free, national, award-winning resources that demystify health insurance information and help consumers plan for their healthcare costs and navigate the healthcare system. The slide deck from the webinar presentation can be found here.

Fifteen years ago, FAIR Health was established to bring transparency and integrity to healthcare costs and health insurance information for all participants in the healthcare system. Equipped with an unparalleled database of over 46 billion privately billed healthcare claim records and a separate collection of over 47 billion Medicare Parts A, B and D claim records, FAIR Health furthers its mission by making available free, consumer-friendly tools and resources on a dedicated website, FAIR Health Consumer, and a mobile app, FH^® Consumer Classroom.

In addition to its consumer-oriented resources, FAIR Health fulfills its nonprofit mission through the issuance of white papers, data briefs and interactive "trackers" illuminating various corners of the healthcare system; the ongoing production of a broad suite of benchmark products separately featuring in-network negotiated amounts and billed charges; and insightful custom analytics for the full spectrum of healthcare stakeholders.

FAIR Health Consumer

FAIR Health's award-winning consumer website, available in English (fairhealthconsumer.org) and Spanish (fairhealthconsumidor.org), enables thousands of insured and uninsured patients per week to estimate and plan for their healthcare expenditures and offers a rich educational platform on the fundamentals of health insurance.

The following tools and resources are featured on the consumer website:

FH^® Medical Cost Estimator and FH^® Dental Cost Estimator. These tools allow consumers to estimate in-network and out-of-network costs for medical and dental care by procedure and geographic location. Using the geo-compare feature, consumers can explore cost estimates in adjacent areas. They can also customize their cost estimates for out-of-network services based on the specifics of their plan's design.
Body Part Procedure Locator. This tool uses a map of the human body to help consumers identify medical procedures and the estimated costs for those procedures in consumers' geographical locations. The Body Part Procedure Locator is intuitive, requiring only a knowledge of the part of the body that is affected. The consumer does not need advance knowledge of the relevant procedure code; instead, the tool guides the consumer from the affected body part to the most frequently searched codes.
FH^® Total Treatment Cost. To educate consumers about bundled payment models, the FH Total Treatment Cost tool provides estimates of the typical costs for all components of care for certain chronic conditions (like asthma), event-based procedures (like a knee replacement) and acute conditions (such as pregnancy or COVID-19). The tool provides both in-network and out-of-network, geographic-specific costs.
Shoppable Services Tool. This easy-to-use tool allows consumers to browse through more than 300 shoppable services, or search for a specific service, using the same procedure codes that hospitals and healthcare providers use to bill for services. The tool provides both in-network and out-of-network, geographic-specific costs, along with the costs for other related services (e.g., anesthesia).
Shared Decision-Making Feature. This section provides an introduction to shared decision making—the patient-clinician discussion regarding treatment options—as well as several decision aids that combine clinical and cost information for palliative care-related scenarios and conditions especially pertinent to people of color and older adults.
Older Adults Feature. Designed to empower a diverse audience of older adults and their caregivers, the Older Adults section offers actionable tools, content and resources intended to help older patients make informed healthcare decisions. Resources include decision aids and total treatment cost scenarios for serious health conditions that affect older adults, as well as checklists and educational content on topics such as financial health literacy.
FH^® Insurance Basics. FH Insurance Basics is an original series of articles and videos that explain how health coverage works in consumer-friendly language. Making complex topics understandable, this educational curriculum helps consumers to decide which plan option is right for them, find explanations of terms and concepts relevant to their health plans, understand their medical bills, evaluate the differences among settings for care and more.
Resource Links, Glossary and Healthcare Quality Toolkit. Additional consumer website features include links to external resources that assist consumers with their health and health insurance; a glossary of commonly used medical, dental and health insurance terms; and a healthcare quality toolkit that helps consumers compare the quality of healthcare providers.

FH Consumer Classroom

FH Consumer Classroom is a free mobile app that offers FAIR Health's consumer content in a concise, user-friendly format. The app, available in English and Spanish on the Apple App Store and Google Play, enables users to learn about health insurance and the healthcare system through articles, videos, a glossary, and other key resources .

FAIR Health's consumer resources have been recognized by scores of media outlets nationwide and have received honors from healthcare sector and government leaders as critical and actionable tools for consumer engagement and protection.

This information, and more, can be found in the webinar presentation. To view the slides presented during the webinar, click here.

About FAIR Health
FAIR Health is a national, independent nonprofit organization that qualifies as a public charity under section 501(c)(3) of the federal tax code. It is dedicated to bringing transparency to healthcare costs and health insurance information through data products, consumer resources and health systems research support. FAIR Health possesses the nation's largest collection of private healthcare claims data, which includes over 46 billion claim records and is growing at a rate of over 3 billion claim records a year. FAIR Health licenses its privately billed data and data products—including benchmark modules, data visualizations, custom analytics and market indices—to commercial insurers and self-insurers, employers, providers, hospitals and healthcare systems, government agencies, researchers and others. Certified by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) as a national Qualified Entity, FAIR Health also receives data representing the experience of all individuals enrolled in traditional Medicare Parts A, B and D, which accounts for a separate collection of over 47 billion claim records; FAIR Health includes among the private claims data in its database, data on Medicare Advantage enrollees. FAIR Health can produce insightful analytic reports and data products based on combined Medicare and commercial claims data for government, providers, payors and other authorized users. FAIR Health's systems for processing and storing protected health information have earned HITRUST CSF certification and achieved AICPA SOC 2 Type 2 compliance by meeting the rigorous data security requirements of these standards. As a testament to the reliability and objectivity of FAIR Health data, the data have been incorporated in statutes and regulations around the country and designated as the official, neutral data source for a variety of state health programs, including workers' compensation and personal injury protection (PIP) programs. FAIR Health data serve as an official reference point in support of certain state balance billing laws that protect consumers against bills for surprise out-of-network and emergency services. FAIR Health also uses its database to power a free consumer website available in English and Spanish, which enables consumers to estimate and plan for their healthcare expenditures and offers a rich educational platform on health insurance. An English/Spanish mobile app offers the same educational platform in a concise format and links to the cost estimation tools. The website has been honored by the White House Summit on Smart Disclosure, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), URAC, the eHealthcare Leadership Awards, appPicker, Employee Benefit News and Kiplinger's Personal Finance. For more information on FAIR Health, visit fairhealth.org.