I 
116TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 3965 
To amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for enhancements to 
requirements for public disclosure of hospital price data. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JULY 25, 2019 
Mr. LIPINSKI introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
Committee on Energy and Commerce 
A BILL 
To amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for 
enhancements to requirements for public disclosure of 
hospital price data. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Hospital Price Trans-
parency and Disclosure Act’’. 
SEC. 2. ENHANCING PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OF HOSPITAL 
PRICE DATA. 
Section 2718(e) of the Public Health Service Act is 
amended— 
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(1) by striking ‘‘CHARGES.—Each hospital’’ 
and inserting ‘‘CHARGES.— 
‘‘(1) IN GENERAL.—Each hospital’’; and 
(2) by adding at the end the following new 
paragraphs: 
‘‘(2) FORMAT.—The guidelines developed under 
paragraph (1) shall provide that all standard 
charges described in paragraph (1) are published in 
a uniform, machine-readable format. 
‘‘(3) PUBLIC POSTING OF DATA.— 
‘‘(A) PUBLIC
POSTING
OF
DATA.—The 
guidelines developed under paragraph (1) shall 
provide that the standard charges described in 
paragraph (1) shall be made public by hospitals 
through a process specified by the Secretary 
under which the standard charges are sub-
mitted by the hospitals to the Secretary and the 
Secretary promptly posts the standard charges 
on the official public Internet site of the De-
partment of Health and Human Services. Such 
data shall be set forth in a manner that pro-
motes charge comparison among hospitals and 
in a manner that compares the price data for 
an item or service submitted by the hospital 
with the price payable for the same item or 
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service under title XVIII of the Social Security 
Act. 
‘‘(B) ACCESS.—In carrying out subpara-
graph (A), the Secretary shall create applica-
tion programming interfaces and take any other 
necessary steps to facilitate access to data sub-
mitted pursuant to paragraph (1) to third par-
ties seeking to present such data in a con-
sumer-friendly format. 
‘‘(C) NOTICE
OF
AVAILABILITY.—Each 
hospital required to submit data under this sub-
section shall prominently post at each admis-
sion site of the hospital a notice of the avail-
ability of the data so submitted on the official 
public Internet site under subparagraph (A). 
‘‘(4) CIVIL
MONETARY
PENALTY.—The Sec-
retary may impose a civil monetary penalty of not 
more than $10,000 for each knowing violation of 
paragraph (1) or (3)(C) by a hospital. The provi-
sions of subsection (i)(2) of section 351A shall apply 
with respect to civil monetary penalties under this 
paragraph in the same manner as such provisions 
apply to civil monetary penalties under subsection 
(i)(1) of such section. 
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‘‘(5) METHOD
FOR
DETERMINING
ACTUAL 
CHARGE.—Not later than 18 months after the date 
of the enactment of the Hospital Price Transparency 
and Disclosure Act, the Secretary shall pursuant to 
rulemaking develop a method to determine and make 
publicly available information on total amounts actu-
ally negotiated for and charged by a hospital to pa-
tients for the items and services appearing on its 
standard charge list, and accepted by the hospital as 
payment in full. In determining the method for the 
disclosure of such negotiated charges, the Secretary 
may take steps to reduce the risk of the anti-com-
petitive use of such data or market collusion, such 
as by using averages, ranges, rankings, trends, or 
other means as the Secretary determines reasonable. 
‘‘(6) REPORTS.—Beginning not later than 18 
months after the date of the enactment of the Hos-
pital Price Transparency and Disclosure Act, and 
annually thereafter, the Secretary shall make public 
on the Internet site described in paragraph (3)(A) a 
report analyzing trends in standard and negotiated 
charges over time, analyzing trends in standard and 
negotiated rates relative to Medicare payments, and 
providing recommendations as needed on statutory 
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changes to increase medical price transparency and 
public insight into health care pricing.’’. 
Æ 
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