What’s in a Name?
‘FireLight’ brings to mind a time long ago when humans would gather around a fire and share information that was essential for their survival. We hope to keep that tradition alive by sharing information that can help employers, unions, individuals and families survive a healthcare environment that is capable of inflicting unforeseeable financial harm.
We also hope to light a fire under the healthcare marketplace to end to the cozy complacency that surrounds how healthcare is priced and paid for in the U.S.
Studies have found that prices for the same procedure, within the same city, are often 4 to 5 times higher at one facility compared to another. That’s shocking, and it reveals just how dysfunctional healthcare pricing is. Our mission is to increase transparency in healthcare and provide tools that empower businesses, employees and families to make healthcare choices with solid information about cost, convenience and quality.
FireLight PriceSearch (beta) is one of the first services to reveal actual hospital prices (not estimates) so that individuals and families can better navigate a system that has the potential to damage their financial health. For years, hospitals and health insurance companies have entered into confidential contracts setting the price for thousands of procedures and treatments — and patients were not permitted to know how much they would be charged until the bill arrived. With prices hidden and no real competition, all of us have been paying for unsustainable increases every year, whether through payroll deductions, our tax dollars (for government health programs) or directly through high deductibles and co-insurance.
