Healthcare Costs

Millions Choose the Tax Penalty over ObamaCare Insurance

Starting January 1st, 2014, Americans were given a choice between complying with the federal mandate to buy ObamaCare health insurance plans or paying a penalty set according to their taxable yearly income and size of their households. However, many are opting for what’s behind Door #2. According to the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation, approximately six million Americans would rather pay the annual penalty rather than purchase insurance plans.

Of the six million, 10% are below the federal poverty level for 2016, which is estimated to be $12,000 for an individual and $24,600 for families with four. While the penalty is $285 per family at most in 2014, it is expected to rise to $975 in 2015 and $2,085 by 2016. Meanwhile, for individuals, the cost would be $95 in 2014 and $325 and $695 for 2015 and 2016 respectively.

Many Are Choosing to Pay the Fine

Interestingly, many employers across the United States are choosing to pay the fine rather than offering employer-based health insurance since the former is much cheaper. According to a report from the House Ways and Means Committee, 71 of the top 100 American companies would rather drop their health care plans and pay the penalty to save handsome amounts of money. In fact, the71 Fortune 100 companies surveyed estimate savings of up to $28.6 billion by 2014 alone if they paid the penalty for not providing health insurance to their employees.

Also forgoing ObamaCare health insurance coverage are those exempted from penalties altogether. Individuals with income so low that they won’t file a federal tax return or those unable to find coverage that costs less than 8% of their annual income are spared from paying fines. Other individuals exempted from fines include Indian tribe members, citizens whose religious beliefs clash with health insurance, overseas Americans, undocumented immigrants, people serving sentence in prison, and members of a health care sharing ministry.

Risk of Facing Huge Medical Bills

If you decide to join these six million individuals and opt out of the mandatory “affordable” health care insurance policies offered, you need to understand that you’ll be responsible for all costs, starting from doctor visits to ambulance rides. You may also be at the risk of facing huge medical bills, forcing you to personal bankruptcy. However, there is still hope.

In order to keep your costs low, you need to start searching for the prices of specific procedures online just like you would usually when shopping for a product or service. Using tools such a Yempl, you can easily get the procedure prices of providers in your area and easily compare them with a few clicks. This will help you get a service within your budget and save you from the hidden disadvantages of ObamaCare. So make the smartest choice for yourself and start shopping and comparing medical service rather than depending on health care insurance.

 

Find prices for medical services and procedures in your area www.yempl.com

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Inernational Medical Tourism

International Travelers are Looking for Prices for Medical Services in US

The United States receives ample visitors from across the world. However, despite their preparations, there is always a chance that they may get sick. This is when they start searching for quality and affordable care in the country. If they’re not able to find you or can’t access the prices of your services or procedures, chances are that you’ll miss the opportunity of getting them back to health.

If you would like your healthcare facility to provide treatment for international patients, you need Yempl.com, the largest directory of medical rates. Yempl.com provides physician and members of the healthcare industry with the chance to seek physicians according to specialty, zip code or city, procedure offered, or symptoms the patient may be suffering from.

Understanding Patients’ Behaviors

Despite being from another country, international visitors/patients behave just like the locals. They will always seek the best value, i.e. the right balance between money and quality of service. In this case, they will resort to platforms like Yempl.com to help them get what they want.

Our platform provides access to thousands of medical facilities and professionals in the city or zip code the traveler resides in. Yempl.com also allows them to compare the cost of a certain service from different providers. Since the tourists may have come to the States on a tight budget, the price of your service will definitely matter. This is especially true if they are from countries where the price of the U.S. dollar is higher than the local currency.

What You Should Do

In order to ensure that you get to interact and heal international patients, you should get your practice’s name on Yempl.com’s directory. What makes us one of your best choices is that our service is free. You can create your own profile and list the rates of your services and medical procedures. If you want to attract even more patients, you can always combine your services in packages and deals or offer promotions. These will definitely get you many clients and help you establish your practice’s name.

To further ensure that your practice receives more traffic, we will tend to your SEO needs and promote your practice and its prices. Rest assured that your profile page will grace the top search engines, including Google, Bing and Yahoo. Yempl.com will also create multiple links from your profile to your website, boosting the latter’s standing in search engine results and complementing any optimization techniques it may have implemented.

So if you would like to help U.S. visitors get healthy before they head back home, don’t hesitate to join the Yempl.com community of healthcare professionals and get your prices listed to gain their trust and business.

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High Deductibles

Obama Care and High Deductibles – Yempl.com

One of the immediate consequences of the Affordable Care Act – popularly called Obama Care – is that it brings with it a rapid spread of high deductibles among insurance plans available on the Health Care Exchanges. Where many consumers once had access to insurance plans with affordable deductibles, under Obama Care these rates have skyrocketed. Under the Silver Plan, the most commonly selected insurance plan, the annual deductible is about $3,000. And under the Bronze Plan – touted as the most affordable insurance plan under Obama Care, the deductible is a whopping $5,000. And these rates are already scheduled to increase in 2015. At these rates, it can take dozens of visits to the doctor to meet these deductibles.

Rapid Spread of High Deductibles

Essentially, this means that consumers – and in particular, low-income consumers who cannot afford the high premiums of the Gold Plan – will be forced to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket for doctor appointments, screening tests and prescription medication before they reach their deductible. Estimates indicate that as many as three in four American families are living paycheck-to-paycheck. These families are more likely to opt for insurance plans like the Bronze or Silver plan under Obama Care because of their lower monthly premiums. But first-time insurance buyers in this group will undoubtedly have difficulty affording their high deductibles.

20% Did Not Make Their First Premium Payment

Because of these high deductibles, many consumers are looking for options that can save them money on costly medical procedures and reduce the amount they have to spend on office visits.  And about twenty percent of those who signed up for Obama Care did not make their first premium payment. After ninety days of nonpayment, those consumers lose their coverage – an option many are considering. They may determine that it is more affordable for them to pay the $75 annual fine and pay for doctor visits and procedures out of pocket, rather than pay premiums that are saddled with high deductibles.

Affordable Rates for Procedures

Consumers who choose this option will undoubtedly want to shop for the most affordable rates for procedures. Yempl.com allows patients to find the most suitable and inexpensive rates for procedures they need. With Yempl’s procedure and service search engine, patients can find and compare doctors in their area and quickly determine which ones provide the services they need at a rate they can afford. Doctors’ individual rates are conveniently displayed in a results page, along with their ratings on various health care websites.

With this powerful tool at their disposal, patients are empowered to make the right health care decisions and find providers that are best for their budget and patient needs. They won’t have to spend more than they can afford on doctor visits and procedures they need. Patients can save thousands of dollars on health care costs and work with reliable, trusted providers.

Medical Directories Is it Worth the Effort

Advertising on Major Medical Directories? Is it Worth the Effort?

In order to stay abreast of developments in the current health care marketplace, many private practices and health care providers consider advertising on large online medical directories. It’s not an uncommon belief that simply by listing your practice on one of these directories, you will see an increase in new patient business. But the fact is that this is not always the case. Major medical directories are useful as a place to list your information so that patients who are already using your practice can quickly and easily find your contact information – and this can often assist them in promoting your business by word of mouth. But beyond that, most major medical directories do not do much in terms of boosting the online presence or overall visibility of health care providers’ practices. Not only that, but these directories generally all offer the same basic provider information. This makes it difficult for patients to do any real comparison of providers, their services offered, or their pricing structures for the procedures they perform.

Your Online Presence

As patients are becoming increasingly connected via the internet and mobile devices, it’s critical for individual providers to distinguish themselves online. In a competitive health care market, the best thing you can do for your practice in order to attract new business is to ensure that your web presence is not only prominent but also comprehensive. It’s important to make sure that patients can access all of the information they need to make the decision to come to your practice instead of your competitors’. This means they should be able to find out what procedures you offer, what the prices for those procedures are, and whether you offer any package rates. This is especially important as more patients are shopping around for the most affordable health care prices, and most major health care directories simply do not give you the option provide this information.

Procedure Reviews

As patients increasingly search for health care providers online, having reliable procedure reviews for potential patients to read is becoming more and more vital to bringing in new business. Currently, consumers rely on user reviews for everything from Amazon purchases to deciding which restaurant to dine at – and they are relying on them to choose health care providers as well. The best way to stay ahead of the curve is to make sure you provide potential patients with reviews of your procedures from multiple search engines.

That’s precisely what Yempl gives your practice. Yempl is a searchable database of over eighty specialties and dozens of medical procedures that allows you to display patient reviews from multiple search engines – right next to your profile and a breakdown of your procedure costs. Presented with this information, patients are far more likely to choose your services over a practice that simply lists credentials and contact information. Help your practice attract new patients with Yempl’s support. You’ll start to see the difference right away.

Compare Medical Cost

Medical Cost: Procedure Price Comparison | Yempl.com

Although the Affordable Care Act – popularly called Obama Care – promised to bring inexpensive insurance to millions of Americans, many consumers have found that the high cost of deductibles coupled with unaffordable monthly premiums are too costly for their budgets. Many Americans are currently living paycheck-to-paycheck, and even with federal subsidies designed to bring down the monthly medical cost of their premiums, they are still unable to bear the financial burden of the Obama Care plans available on the Health Care Exchanges. Because of this, they are opting to pay the $75 penalty for not having health insurance and pay for doctor visits and medical procedure costs out of pocket; over the long term, many consumers are finding this option to be the more affordable one.

Compare Prices for Medical Procedures

Because it can cost less to pay cash directly to a health care provider rather than carry the burden of monthly premiums and high deductibles, it is in the best interest of these consumers to be able to quickly and effortlessly locate the most affordable prices for medical procedures in their area. Calling around to various doctors’ offices can be a prolonged endeavor that most consumers just don’t have time for. And shopping by price alone may result in finding doctors that are not providing the best medical services at the lowest rates.

Yempl provides a solution to both the problem of finding affordable prices for procedures and locating highly-rated doctors. Yempl is an online database of doctors and medical procedures that patients can use to search for health care providers based on specific procedure prices. With Yempl, you can compare medical cost from doctors in your area and determine which health care providers have the most affordable rates for a variety of different procedures. Procedure categories include Internal Medicine, Physical Therapy, Obstetrics & Gynecology, Ophthalmology, Urology, and Gastroenterology. Patients can also find providers in more than eighty specialties, from Anaplastology to Urology. Once you have refined the search results based on location, specialty and/or procedure, you can compare doctors’ individual procedure rates as well as see reviews and even schedule appointments.

Medical Procedure at Price You Can Afford

Yempl displays each health care provider’s education and experience so that patients can choose the care they need at a price they can afford. With this excellent database at their disposal, patients are now empowered to find a medical professional for virtually any procedure they need – and they won’t have to worry about medical cost. Yempl provides the kind of transparency that takes the guesswork out of finding an affordable, reputable health care provider who can offer the services you need at a price point that works with your budget. Log on to Yempl today to search for doctors, services and procedures in your area that you can afford.

increase cash flow medical practice

How Can Medical Providers Increase Cash Flow?

In the current health care environment, one of the most important concerns health care providers are dealing with is determining how to increase the cash flow into their practice. Insurance providers can take months to pay claims, and in the interim health care providers have to make sure they are bringing in enough cash payments to make up the difference and maintain profitability and practice viability.

One of the best ways health care providers can ensure they are maintaining – and increasing – the cash flow into their practice is by improving their visibility online. As the health care landscape becomes increasingly digitized, more and more patients are searching for providers online. By ensuring that your practice has an outstanding online profile and excellent visibility, you can increase your cash inflow dramatically and without affecting your overhead significantly.

Due to the high cost of deductibles under the Affordable Care Act – popularly known as Obama Care – more and more patients are either opting out altogether or simply trying to find the most affordable out-of-pocket prices for doctor visits and medical procedures. Along with increasing the overall online profile for your practice, Yempl also provides patients with a searchable database that displays the per-procedure costs of a number of different procedures. Yempl is popular with patients because it allows them to find the health care provider that is right for them at a price that is right for their budget.

But Yempl has a great deal of potential for health care providers, too. Yempl not only lists health care providers based on one or more of over eighty specialties – from Anaplastology to Urology – but also allows providers to list procedure prices, education, experience, and patient reviews. This powerful tool allows you to effortlessly improve the online profile of your practice and move your marketing and visibility into the 21st century.

Yempl averages thousands of monthly searches in New York City alone. And it publishes procedures to major search engines like Google and Bing. By pairing with this powerful online marketing tool, you can improve the search results and online presence of your practice overnight – and without investing in costly web development or SEO marketing consultants. Yempl does all of the work for your practice, and saves you marketing costs while increasing profits. All you have to do is sign up, list your rates, and watch your monthly and quarterly cash flow increase dramatically.

With the powerful database Yempl provides helping your practice, you’ll notice immediate results. Sign up today to increase your online profile and start bringing more cash business into your practice right away.

How to Beat ObamaCare with Your Affordable Health Care

Affordable Health Care, How to Beat ObamaCare

ObamaCare, or the Affordable Care Act, was the government’s initiative to provide affordable health insurance to Americans while regulating the health care industry. Technically in its fourth year, the health care reforms have affected many medical providers, forcing them to cut down staff or at times shut down because they can’t cope with budget cuts. However, you can avoid becoming part of the statistics by offering affordable care on your own.

What Affordable Health Care Means for Your Patients

Patients expect their health care providers to offer treatments and medical procedures for a price within their budgets. To them, the cost of a medical procedure shouldn’t depend on your practice’s location or how much you’re paying for rent. Even you know that deep down. Instead, procedures should be priced according to your knowledge and experience as a physician and how highly your patients review your procedures. Therefore, in order to bring in more patients, revise your prices to become more affordable. Affordable Health Care starts with you.

A Strategy to Cut Costs

For many medical practices, affordability can be an issue. However, the best way to ensure this small yet very profitable detail is by cutting costs. While you can’t avoid paying your staff or covering the expenses of your supplies and equipment, there’s one cost you can cut easily: Marketing Expense.

You can easily reduce your marketing costs and ultimately offer more affordable treatments. This comprehensive medical directory provides members of the affordable health care industry with the opportunity to create their own free profiles and list their prices there. This transparency will be greatly appreciated by your patients and they’ll be inspired to schedule an appointment with you.

However, how does all of this help you cut your marketing costs?

For starters, each profile published on Yempl is search engine optimized. This makes your practice more visible online, bringing more traffic from top search engines whenever a patient searches for a procedure you offer or looks up a physician in your city or zip code. As a result, you won’t have to depend on online marketers to help you establish your brand.

Your profile also allows you to include links to your website and social media profiles. This creates back links, which is a technique that helps improve your site’s ranking on search result. Therefore, you’ll be spared from having to market and optimize your practice’s website.

Finally, each review of every procedure you offer will be included in one place for your clients to see. This will save you and your patients the effort of trying to locate patient reviews to vouch for your expertise.

Because of these benefits alone, many Yempl users have been able to slash their costs. Some affordable health care providers have even taken the next step by providing deals and discounts on their treatments. So cut out your marketing cost and join us to give your patients what they need: affordable health care.

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Beware: ObamaCare’s Low Premium Plans Come with High

ObamaCare, or as it’s formally known as The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, has been signed into law to help improve the American health care system and provide Americans with affordable health insurance. As tempting as this may sound, there is a catch many insurance coverage shoppers are discovering: plans with lower premiums are offered with high deductibles, large costs for prescription drugs, and other cost-sharing.

Crunching the Numbers

After a “window shopping” feature was added to the website, deductible on policies were revealed to go as high as $5,000 for every individual and up to $10,000 for a couple. This means that an insured individual needs to pay these amounts from their own pocket before they can benefit from their insurance coverage.

Studying the health insurance plans further, the average individual deductible for the bronze plans is $5,081 per year in 34 of the 36 states that require federally-run health exchanges. This is approximately 42% higher than the average deductible for an individually purchased plan, which was estimated to be $3,589 in 2013.

So, in an effort to cover the out-of-pocket costs which millions of Americans will have to pay, the government has been focusing on the affordability of the ObamaCare insurance plans. Moreover, the Affordable Care Act ensured the availability of tax credits to cover the insurance premiums of individuals whose income annually is four times the poverty level, i.e. $45,960 per person. Even the subsidies that cover some of the deductibles available for individuals earning 2.5 more than the poverty level ($28,725 per person) are only offered for the holders of the pricey silver plan.

The Alternative Solution

As private insurers have priced the deductibles around $6,350 per person per annum and $12,700 per family per annum, it’s apparent that they are only complying with the ACA part which states that coverage should ensure essential services like routine preventative care. However, so far, ObamaCare hasn’t been able to control how much insurance companies could charge. Because of this little fact alone, many individuals and families have decided against going for ObamaCare.

Instead, people whose medical costs are frequent and usually high are resorting to comparing the price for procedures in an effort to save money. Some would rather pay the $75 fine linked to paying cash to their physicians rather than taking out a health care policy and paying monthly premiums only to be further burdened by their ailments and more expenses.

As you can see, ObamaCare may not really help in ensuring access to quality and affordable health care to the masses. Therefore, make the right decision and avoid high out-of-pocket expenses by comparing the costs of medical procedures and select the best one for you and your family. You probably do the same while shopping, so why not your own health?

Find prices for medical services and procedures in your area: yempl.com

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