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Comment by tapatio | Hacker News Reader

How were you able to do this if billing codes are copyrighted? Where did you get all of the billing codes? Also, isn't this pointless as the final pricing is highly dependent upon one's insurance policy? Also, the price differs if you pay cash versus with insurance.

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I'm the author of the article, but I'm not a lawyer.

Regarding your first point:

I'm aware of the copyright on billing codes. I suspect it means "you can't make your own billing codes based off of our system."

I don't think it means you can't republish the codes anywhere. They're republished all the time.

Someone can jump in and correct me.

Secondly:

The CMS law required hospitals to itemize their procedures by billing code _and_ by insurance company. Not that they all do that, but in theory, these negotiated rates should allow you to price shop between hospitals. The "list prices" are effectively meaningless.

I'd guess factual information can't be copyrighted, it's not a creative work.

The American Medical Association copyrighted it. I didn't know factual information can't be copyrighted. The "copyright" text on their website is rubbish then. Learn something new everyday. Thanks!

I think simply a collection of facts can't be copyrighted. It must have some kind of creative added value for copyright to be applicable, like an encyclopedia presenting these facts may be would be an example.

And yeah, it's not uncommon for some to slap "copyrighted" on something where it's not applicable.

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