By Nicolas Terry and Frank Pasquale
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This week features Professor Erin C. Fuse Brown of Georgia State University’s College of Law. We discussed her fascinating work on the law & policy of consumer protection in health care, including the new article “Consumer Financial Protection in Health Care.”
Our discussion centered on surprise medical bills (including balance billing),“inscrutable price opacity,” and medical debt collection. This is a difficult area and one that implementers of the ACA have only begun to confront. Looking forward, our consensus was that this increasingly will become the province of “bifurcated” state laws passed under the specter of ERISA preemption–which could leave those in self-insured plans at the mercy of their employers.
For a thoughtful perspective on cutting edge efforts to protect patients from surprise bills and opaque billing, there is no better resource. And be sure to check out her SSRN Page for other important work on ongoing efforts to bend the cost curve in health care and assure more universal access to care.
The Week in Health Law Podcast from Frank Pasquale and Nicolas Terry is a commuting-length discussion about some of the more thorny issues in Health Law & Policy. Subscribe at iTunes, listen at Stitcher Radio, Tunein and Podbean, or search for The Week in Health Law in your favorite podcast app. Show notes and more are at TWIHL.com. If you have comments, an idea for a show or a topic to discuss you can find us on twitter @nicolasterry @FrankPasquale @WeekInHealthLaw
