Data updated 2016-09-21 from CMS.gov

Originally posted 2013-05-17

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (cms.gov) released a report detailing Medicare Provider Charge Data which shows the cost of procedures or DRGs at various hospitals across the US. This really got me thinking about how I could possibly help those in need of one of these procedures and it dawned on me that if I visualized this data, perhaps people could find nearby hospitals that could save them money on the procedures they needed. Here are the basic steps to use the tool below. Please let me know if you find this useful or interesting at all by tweeting me or leaving a comment below.

Select a Procedure (DRG) Select a state or choose ‘all’ (optional) Select a region or choose ‘all’ (optional)

Interactive features

Select on color legend “Range of Charges” to filter map and see providers

Select points on map to see providers in those zip codes

About the data

Sourced from CMS.gov the data here include hospital-specific charges for the more than 3,000 U.S. hospitals that receive Medicare Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) payments for discharges, paid under Medicare based on a rate per discharge using the Medicare Severity Diagnosis Related Group (MS-DRG) for Fiscal Year (FY) 2014. These MS-DRGs represent more than 7 million discharges or 75 percent of total Medicare IPPS discharges.