The  majority of the nation’s not just top hospitals, but regional hospitals regarded as the top hospitals in that area, do not accept plans purchased on the exchange.

It’s surprising that this hasn’t been a huge story— I think mostly because the healthcare.gov debacle has sidetracked journalists. Here’s one article. 

This is a very, very important issue. The government can mandate that we all purchase health insurance. But they didn’t mandate that providers take the insurance we’re mandated to purchase. Sure, you can purchase health insurance, but you will only be able to use it at hospitals like Woodhull in Brooklyn, not Columbia or NYU.

The most important thing to remember is having health insurance doesn’t guarantee you have access to healthcare. That’s a much, much harder issue to solve. That’s why I think Sherpaa is the future. Companies purchase health insurance for their employees. But they can’t solve the access to timely, high quality care issue. That’s what we do. Having health insurance only solves half the problem. Access completes the picture.