Several Chicago-area hospitals have been honored for excellence in price transparency two and a half years after a set of federal transparency guidelines went into effect.

       Rush University Medical Center was one of 10 hospitals nationwide to receive the inaugural Price Transparency Champion Award, honoring medical systems going above and beyond to keep price estimates accessible and upfront.

       The awards were created by PatientRightsAdvocate.org, a health care advocacy nonprofit that has lobbied at the federal level for price transparency for more than seven years.

       The organization releases compliance reports every six months. Founder Cynthia Fisher hopes the awards will bring publicity to the hospitals PatientRightsAdvocate.org sees as positive examples.

       “What the consumer needs in health care is to have integrity built into the system,” Fisher said. “Almost everyone has a story of being overcharged.”

       Among the hospitals selected, Rush was named best in class by PatientRightsAdvocate.

       “Rush University Medical Center, their file network is excellent in that you can download easily accessible, machine readable — but most importantly, human readable (data),” Fisher said.

       Patricia Steeves O’Neil, senior vice president and chief financial officer of Rush University Medical Center and Rush University System for Health, said Rush is proud to be recognized as a national leader on the issue of price transparency.

       “Understanding the cost of health care can be challenging for patients,” O’Neil told the Chicago Tribune. “Price transparency empowers patients to make fully informed decisions about their care.”

       The Rush system also includes Rush Copley Medical Center and Rush Oak Park Hospital.

       CommonSpirit Health, a large Catholic and nonprofit hospital chain headquartered in Chicago, also received a Price Transparency Champion Award.

       The group has one of the highest levels of price transparency compliance compared with other national health care groups, PatientRightsAdvocate found, with 88% compliance across 140 hospitals in 21 states.

       CommonSpirit Health could not be reached for comment.

       Under the Hospital Price Transparency Rule, hospitals must release a pricing sheet explaining how much each medical procedure and service costs. The sheet has to be readable by machine and should include the gross cost of each procedure, as well as the maximum and minimum rates negotiated for other consumers and any discounted cash prices.

       The rule went into effect in 2021 under the Trump administration. It’s meant to force hospitals to set a public standard for what they typically charge patients, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

       “Often we’re finding so many people have been overcharged when they seek care,” Fisher said. “Prices protect people from going into medical debt, having bad credit or having to go to court to have their wages garnished.”

       Before the rule, most hospital price transparency databases were managed by federal organizations and focused mostly on surgery price and inpatient care.

       Data on testing, screening and drug/medication pricings were harder to find, according to the Federal Register. Meanwhile, estimations could vary wildly by website.

       Rush published a price estimator tool online on Jan. 1, 2021, the same day the rule went into effect.

       The American Hospital Association found that 7 in 10 hospitals are compliant with the federal Hospital Price Transparency Rule. However, PatientRightsAdvocate.org contends that 64% of hospitals either released incomplete information or didn’t comply with the rule at all, based on their own studies.

       To date, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have fined seven hospitals for failing to release price data. Community First Medical Center, in Portage Park, was fined about $850,000 in 2022. The charge is under review.

       Price transparency is also important for helping companies choose a health insurance policy, Fisher said.

       “What this price reveal has enabled us to see is that on the same day, in the same hospital, prices vary based upon plan,” Fisher said.

       The organization’s next steps, Fisher said, could include finding ways to help patients dispute outsize medical bills that don’t align with publicly available price tags.

       “It’s important to recognize the hospitals that are taking the lead to do the right thing by providing actual prices, and allowing integrity in how they bill,’ Fisher said.