Cost of average hospital stay skyrockets 98% since 2004

With the 2023 Open Enrollment season here, ValuePenguin.com by Lending Tree has compiled its health care data in an expansive online hub.

Here’s a quick rundown of some of the highlights:

• The average hospital stay in the United States equates to 504 hours of work.

That’s because hospital bills run to $2,873 per day in 2022; with Americans earning an average wage of $26.22 per hour, it takes 504 hours of work to afford a 4.6-day hospital stay out of pocket. Compare that to $1,450 per day, the average cost of a hospital stay in 2004. Back then, the average hourly wage was $17.86 — equating to only 374 hours of work to pay for a 4.6-day out-of-pocket hospital stay.

“From health insurance costs and hospital expenses to drug prices, everything is getting more expensive every year,” ValuePenguin health insurance expert Nick VinZant says. “I also think we’ll find that the coronavirus pandemic sent that into overdrive. In fact, per-patient hospital expenses alone increased by 10% in 2020.”

• Spending on prescription and nonprescription drugs is up 77% since 2010.

Nationally, prescriptions cost $4,571 a year per household, with Delaware coming in with the highest per-household cost at $6,513. Only two other states — Kentucky ($6,033) and Tennessee ($6,007) — pass the $6,000 level. The states with the lowest prescription costs per household are North Dakota ($2,772), South Dakota ($3,194), and Montana ($3,261).

“Each year, we see an increase in overall prescription use, along with higher strengths and stronger dosages being prescribed,” according to Robin Townsend, a health insurance research analyst for ValuePenguin. “Research and manufacturing costs also continue to rise, resulting in higher prices for both prescription and nonprescription drugs.”

That said, only 5% of prescriptions are paid for entirely out of pocket across the United States.

• More than half of Americans who get health insurance through their employer enrolled in high-deductible health plans in 2020.

In 2015, only 39.4% enrolled in such plans. The average family health insurance premium has increased 47% since 2011 and 22% since 2016, which explains the growing interest in insurance options with lower premiums, according to ValuePenguin.com researchers.

“More consumers are enrolling in HDHPs to help them manage health care costs,” Townsend says. “Rather than pay higher premiums in advance for insurance they may not use, healthier consumers find that HDHPs allow them more control over their health care spending.”

• Overall health care spending jumped from $2.69 trillion to $3.07 trillion between 2016 and 2019.

That’s an increase of 14.3% — and 2019 also was the first time health care spending topped $3 trillion. What’s more, the cost of all but six medical conditions are rising, with influenza leading the way. Between 2016 and 2019, flu treatment costs and the number of flu diagnoses increased by 120.4% and 121.3%, respectively.

• Nearly 1 in 10 Americans don’t have health insurance.

A ValuePenguin analysis finds that 8.0% of Americans don’t have health insurance — down from 10.5% in 2020. The four states with the highest rates of uninsured Americans are Mississippi (14.4%), Texas (13.0%), Oklahoma (12.4%), and Georgia (12.0%).

Related: 5 states where health care spending is increasing the most, least

Before the pandemic, according to data from the National Center for Health Statistics, uninsured rates among Americans younger than 65 had fallen since the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 — from 18.2% in 2010 to 12.1% in 2019. The uninsured rate among this group was lowest in 2016 (10.4%).