The Delaware Department of Health and Social Services launches a new and enhanced version of its CostAware website.
CostAware compares health care costs based on medical claims in Delaware, and is designed to help residents understand how their health care dollars are being spent.
The updated version – CostAware 2.0 – will feature the average cost estimates for episodes of care reported for named Delaware hospitals, estimates of the average cost per visit for additional medical services, and results reported by type of care setting.
It will also include improved filtering of results by insurance category and patient age range and gender.
Jonathan Mathieu is a senior consultant with Freedman Healthcare which helped DHSS build the website, and he explains other differences.
"CostAware 1.0 for the initial release had a limited number of procedures and data for just one year, and CostAware 2.0 allows you to look at variation in the measures across 3 years of data 2019, 20 and 21. There's a much larger number of procedures available on the new version of the website," said Mathieu
It will also show changes over time in average cost, quality, and other measures while also featuring improved filtering of results.
"It can inform policy makers on looking at our healthcare delivery system and cross trends, but I think ultimately it gives Delawareans the ability to look at a cost of a procedure particularly if there's a certain out-of-pocket cost for them," said Steven Costantino, director of health care reform with DHSS.
Residents can access the website at costaware.dhss.delaware.gov.
