chargemaster
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.28 in modern English
20
Scrabble Score
12
Letters
3
Syllables
9
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A comprehensive list maintained by a hospital of prices of goods and services it will bill to its patients and their respective health insurers.
American usage
Example Sentences
- "The patient faced bankruptcy because she couldn't pay off the hundreds of thousands of dollars accrued from her hospital bill, including a price from the chargemaster for a single acetaminophen pill at ten times the cost for the same pill over-the-counter at a pharmacy."
- "Much ink has been spilt bemoaning that incomprehensible foundation of hospital cost accounting and prices, the redoubtable chargemaster."
- "The higher the chargemaster markup over cost, the greater the potential for profit."
- "What a hospital is actually paid by an MCO, Medicare, or Medicaid is rarely even close to what is listed on the chargemaster. In fact, only the uninsured are subject to those charges."
- "Of particular importance, other than in Maryland, hospitals are generally free to charge whatever they want in their chargemaster."
- "California is a unique state in that all hospitals are required to submit a copy of their chargemasters, which the state then posts online for all consumers and patients to see."
Etymology
Usage
- American usage