Survey%3A High Deductible Plan Members See Less Cost Data

Meanwhile, only 54% of the affluent, highly educated CDHP members said their health plans were easy to understand. About 69% of the traditional plan members said their plans were easy to understand.

The EBRI and Commonwealth Fund researchers found that CDHP members were about as likely to seek medical care as traditional plan members but somewhat less likely to fill prescriptions.

Only 12% of the CDHP and high-deductible plan members said they believed that their health plans provided information about the cost of care provided by doctors or hospitals.

When the researchers asked traditional plan members about cost information tools, 15% said the traditional plans were giving them information about the cost of hospital care, and 16% said the plans were giving them information about the cost of doctor care.

But only about 1 in 7 of the traditional plan members who had access to provider cost information had tried to use the information, while about 1 in 3 of the CDHP and high-deductible plan members with access to provider cost information had tried to use the information, the researchers write.

CDHP and high-deductible plan members also seemed to be more willing to talk to providers about the cost of care, the researchers write.

The survey "demonstrates that at least one factor crucial to the success of consumer-driven health plans – realistic, useful, accessible health-cost information – does not yet exist on a widespread basis," the researchers conclude.

But it was not immediately clear from the survey data whether the CDHP members might have received more cost data or made more use of such data than the holders of ordinary high-deductible health coverage.