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Re:Direct Primary Care by vpeters25 on Monday January 09, 2017 @01:11PM (#13358335)
> because Medicare reimburses about 7% less than the direct costs of services, in the aggregate. It's one of the reasons you see very few private practices which cater solely, or even primarily, to Medicare patients.

Could you please point us to the source of this information?

It was my understanding, from a news article I read a few years ago, that Medicare evaluates each medical procedure and comes out with a fair price that guarantees fair profit for the provider.

I think it might be that providers cannot charge insane profits to Medicare so they rather avoid dealing with them.

Re:Direct Primary Care by ci5er on Monday January 09, 2017 @10:02PM (#13362195)
Medicare negotiates a MFN clause, so they are - out of the gate - at the lowest rate any clinic ever charges, with no eye towards profitability.

Because it's well known in healthcare economics (or at least finance/administration) I thought the ~7% aggregate number would be widely published and that I'd be able to quickly find a link for you. For reasons I don't understand - it is not - but here is a link that has a chart/graph from Davita that talks about the phenomenon (in micro, not macro):

  - http://www.rationalwalk.com/?p=14802