New Approaches to Controlling Health Care Costs: Bending the Cost Curve for Colonoscopy

Colonoscopy, a poster child for the opacity of medical costs, is performed more than 15 million times a year in the United States. The procedure is simultaneously invasive, effective, feared, costly, cost-effective, and well accepted. In some areas, however, charges can vary more than 10-fold for the same services, from approximately $500 to more than $8000.^1,2