Fair Prices

Our Mission: Four Fair Patient Rights

We're a grassroots, nonpartisan movement for the four fair rights every patient deserves — fair prices, fair notes, fair recording, and fast emergency help. Know your rights, and use them.

Fair Prices

Know the full PIGH Price before any care, get your billing codes in an exportable format to price-shop, and be billed in real time — so you see the price in seconds and can choose at the point of care, not get a surprise bill 90 days later.

Fair Notes

Read every note before you leave the clinic, and respond with a correction in one step — right in the patient portal, not via a fresh PDF. Your account and corrections belong in the record too.

Fair Recording

Recording your own care should be your choice — not the doctor's or the facility's, and never grounds to be denied care. At your option, record or have your encounter recorded, for deeper understanding and quality assurance.

Fast Help

Emergency response as close to 90 seconds as we can get, in coordination with Neighbor 911.

What is PIGH?

PIGH breaks down any healthcare bill into four components. The order matters: Patient first centers you. Healthcare last acknowledges providers often give more than they receive.

  • P

    Patient

    What you owe out-of-pocket. Your actual, real cost.

  • I

    Insurance

    What your coverage handles. Your benefits at work.

  • G

    Government

    Medicare, Medicaid, subsidies, and public programs.

  • H

    Healthcare

    The provider's portion — often absorbing costs to serve you.

Fair Prices — Sample PIGH Breakdown

What a PIGH Breakdown looks like

Here’s a routine clinic visit, itemized with its real billing codes — then split into the four parts of every bill, so you can see who is actually paying for your care.

The itemized charges

Live · visit in progress

This is a running, real-time total — the visit is still happening. The instant a code is entered, its Max Charge posts and is guaranteed; your insurer then negotiates in real time, so lines marked Negotiating settle to Final within minutes — often before you leave. Select on any line to see that item’s own PIGH breakdown.

ServiceCodeMax Charge
Office visit, established patient FinalDeductible met: $1,915 / $2,000CPT 99214$240
Chest X-ray, 2 views NegotiatingDeductible met: $1,940 / $2,000CPT 71046$180
Basic metabolic panel NegotiatingDeductible met: $1,950 / $2,000CPT 80048$90
Diagnosis: chest pain, unspecifiedICD-10 R07.9—
Running total so far$510

The running total, split four ways

Patient (you)Copay + coinsurance$85
InsurancePlan’s negotiated payment$260
GovernmentPublic subsidy / tax-funded share$90
Healthcare providerContractual write-off absorbed$75
Running total$510
Patient Max Charge $85 the most you’ll ever owe
Total Max Charge $510 full billed amount

Either file can be shared as a SMART Health Link — a one-time link plus passcode that keeps the full record behind access control, so only authorized parties can open it.

Your patient share is billed at the Max and adjusted only downward — known and capped from the first minute, never a surprise weeks later. The export is a clean, standard CSV: every code, PIGH price, and finality status, plus your de-identified plan design (deductible, out-of-pocket, coinsurance) so any price-comparison service can estimate accurately. No personal identifiers leave with it — a globally unique access code shields your record, resolved only through trusted, authorized channels.

Illustrative example. Real amounts vary by plan, provider, and place of service — which is exactly why you should be able to see your own PIGH Breakdown, with your codes, in real time.

Fair Prices — Shared Codes

Your codes, in your hands — so you can shop

You can’t compare the price of “a knee MRI.” You can compare the price of code 73721. The diagnostic and billing codes (ICD, CPT/HCPCS) attached to your care are the key that turns an opaque bill into an apples-to-apples shopping list — and Fair Prices means those codes belong to you.

  • See every code. Easy access to all diagnostic and billing codes for your planned, completed, and future-planned care.
  • Export them. Your codes in a standard, portable, machine-readable format — not trapped in a PDF or a portal.
  • Shop and compare. Use your codes — or hand them to a third-party price-comparison service — to compare the exact services across providers and systems in your area.
  • Before you commit. Codes for proposed care, up front, so you can get competing estimates before you say yes.
Fair Prices — Real-Time Billing

Your price, in real time — not in 90 days

When a code is entered into the record, the price should land with it. Fair Prices means real-time billing: no lag between a diagnostic or billing code hitting the electronic medical record and that charge being priced and posted. Within seconds — not weeks, not a quarter. You get a price immediately — the likely or maximum expected amount — and insurers can still negotiate it down or settle disputes afterward; what disappears is the months-long wait to find out what you owe.

  • Priced as it happens. Each service billed the moment it’s delivered — not held until the end of the visit or hospital discharge.
  • Sticker shock now, not later. An immediate price lets you make a different choice at the point of care — decline, ask for an alternative, or shop elsewhere — instead of being extorted after the fact with an inflated bill and months of bickering.
  • Seconds, not months. No waiting 30, 60, or 90 days for a bill to be wrangled to insurance and back before you learn what you owe.
  • Adjust after, don’t wait first. Bill instantly at the likely or maximum expected price, then let insurers rapidly negotiate it down or resolve disputes — adjustments come after, never as an excuse to delay your bill for months.
  • Instant for patients. You should be able to put on your Safety Orange wristband and get your fair price almost instantly — the way every other purchase already works.
Fair Prices — Wristband at Admission

A Safety Orange wristband in every facility

Every patient should be offered a Patient Rights Now Safety Orange wristband at admission — in every hospital and healthcare facility in the country — coded to fair, real-time pricing transparency. The band is an instant, unmistakable signal to every nurse, doctor, and staff member: this patient wants their prices read out from the medical record, in real time.

  • An instant signal. Staff can see from your wristband, at a glance, that you want live price quotes — no forms, no awkward ask at the bedside.
  • Insurance-adjusted in real time. Quotes adjusted automatically through API calls to your insurance plan — your actual coverage, deductible, and copay — so the number you hear is the number you’ll owe.
  • Standard everywhere. The same Safety Orange band, the same right, in every facility nationwide — coded to pricing transparency from the moment of admission.
  • Your choice, on your wrist. Wearing the band is how you opt in to fair, real-time prices — the way a medical-alert bracelet flags an allergy.

Patient-safety standards don’t spread by hope — they spread through accreditation. Hand hygiene, surgical checklists, and patient-ID bands became universal because The Joint Commission and other certifying bodies required them. We’re calling for the Safety Orange wristband and real-time, insurance-adjusted price transparency to join that list — a national accreditation standard upheld by The Joint Commission, DNV Healthcare, CMS Conditions of Participation, and every body that certifies a hospital or healthcare facility in the country.