COST OF FACELIFT DECLINED DURING PAST DECADE

NCPA Daily Policy Digest ^ | May 7, 2003 | Devon Herrick

[bruinbirdman]

Although prices for health care services have risen almost twice as fast as consumer prices generally over the past decade, prices for cosmetic surgery are actually lower in real terms, according to the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA).

The key difference, according to the NCPA, is who pays the bill. Third parties (insurers, employers and government) pay most of the costs of health care. But cosmetic surgery is almost always paid by patients out of their own pocket.

Among the factors that keep cosmetic surgery prices low are the following:

o Cosmetic surgeons search for ways to be efficient; for example, performing operations in their offices, rather in a hospital.

o Cosmetic surgeons often quote patients a package price, and Web sites offer competitive bids for surgical procedures.

o When procedures become pricey, substitute products quickly emerge; for example, laser resurfacing, Retin-A treatments, botox or collagen injections, chemical peels and dermabrasion can replace the need for a costly facelift.

The report says that an explosion of third-party payment of medical bills through Medicaid (for the poor), Medicare (for the elderly) and private insurers is chiefly responsible for medical inflation in the modern era.

Prior to the advent of Medicare and Medicaid, health care spending never exceeded 6 percent of gross national product; now it's 14 percent.

Source: Devon Herrick, "Healthcare Prices Aren't Rising When Patients Pay The Bill: Real Costs of Cosmetic Surgery Fell Over the Last Decade," Brief Analysis No. 437, National Center for Policy Analysis, May 7, 2003.

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[goldstategop]

The day may come when you can get a hair transplant or a facelift for the price of a flight between Los Angeles and New York. Getting more youthful in America is getting cheaper with each passing decade.

[Uncle George]

Yes that "PERMATEX SILICONE SEALER" is a lot cheaper than the medical type.

[SquirrelKing]

If only he'd held on a little longer.

[BOBTHENAILER]

Nancy Pelosi will want to be pinged to this article.

[areafiftyone]

DID SOMEONE SAY FACELIFT?

[TAP ONLINE]

Geenspan warned us of deface ion.

I thought this information would not hold up, but I must face the truth, not raise my eyebrows.

Is that sucking sound the economy or just the lypo machine.

[biblewonk]

I love the necklace.

[scott7278]

She'd have gotten more bang for the buck if she had waited!

[valkyrieanne]

People didn't get quintuple bypasses in the "good old days" either. They just died. It's not possible to blame all the rise in health care costs on the US version of socialized medicine. Some of it is simply because there are more procedures, more expensive procedures, and because doctors' training is still valuable on the market. No one dies because they don't have botox.

What they needed to do was compare the cost of elective plastic surgery to *necessary* plastic surgery (like repairing a cleft palate; severe craniofacial dysplasia, etc.) I'm sure you'd see a corresponding rise in the costs of *medically necessary* plastic surgery.

[TexanToTheCore]

And for some really exciting news, boob jobs in Houston are much, much cheaper than ten years ago. You can get it done over lunch and pay for it with your Visa or Masercard.

[bruinbirdman]

See the full text of the article. The author agrees with some of your points.

Correct link For text

yitbos

[Libertarianize the GOP]

http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list

[cavtrooper21]

If they have gotten so inexpensive, why hasen't Helen "the troll" Thomas gotten one...

[Waco]

The price of paper shreders dropped $harply too. Every dept. store stocks them now also.

[Uncle George]

Helen would be called "Silicone Valley" if they did a complete job.