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LesliesList.org: A Local Resource for the Uninsured Community

Created: Sep 26, 2009 Uploaded by: lramirez2000

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Project Title:LesliesList.org: A Local Resource for the Uninsured Community

Requested amount from Knight News Challenge:1,250,000

Expected amount of time to complete project:3

Total cost of project including all sources of funding:1,280,000

Describe your project:LesliesList.org is a website devoted to helping the uninsured and underinsured find affordable medicine and healthcare in their communities. It provides current pricing information for medications and medical testing, bringing transparency to an otherwise opaque, and thus needlessly expensive, market. Prices can vary by as much as 1,000% from one pharmacy or testing site to another. EXAMPLES: Prescriptions: OrthoCyclen, birth control pill pack: pay $9 (Wal-Mart) or $51 (Walgreens). Zofran, anti- nausea medicine: pay $50 (Costco) or $493 (Kmart). Medical tests: Mammogram: pay $72 or $400. MRI brain: pay $325 or $4,100. Leslieslist.org also provides a compendium of free and low-cost clinics and is searchable by desired service (e.g. pediatrics, gyne, dentistry, etc.) The website is already up and running in the Chicago area. We plan to expand across the country. Major cities in Texas, California and Florida are our next targets because, according to 2008 Census Bureau estimates, these states have the highest numbers of uninsured. We also plan to translate the site into Spanish. In Chicago, LesliesList.org is creating a community among the uninsured and underinsured and the healthcare and social service workers who serve them. The site includes a blog narrowly focused on these groups’ needs, as well as open discussion forums. Of note, no anticipated healthcare reform plan would eliminate out-of-pocket expenditures for drugs and testing, or the need for free and low-cost clinics. Our goal for LesliesList.org is to serve as an information exchange for these services and, through heretofore unavailable price transparency, bring down actual healthcare spending for the uninsured and underinsured.

How will your project improve the way news and information are delivered to geographic communities?Local, accurate, up-to-date pricing information for medications and medical testing is not readily available to uninsured or underinsured patients, nor to their healthcare providers. LesliesList.org intends to change this fact. It is our hope that delivering easy access to price comparison information will help uninsured patients find affordable prescription medicines and testing sites. At the same time, LesliesList.org can educate doctors and other healthcare providers about the cost of the meds and services they are prescribing for their patients and aid them in choosing affordable alternatives.

How is your idea innovative? (new or different from what already exists)Eleven states already mandate drug-price comparison websites. Sadly, most of these sites rely on government data that is often inaccurate and out-of-date. The sites that do attempt “hands on” reporting for pricing info often provide a very abbreviated list, e.g. Maryland’s Prescription Drug Price Finder Web tool lists the price of only 26 medicines. LesliesList.org reports on over 550 medicine prices. We actually invest the time and energy to call and confirm all of this data directly from the pharmacies. As for the medical testing price information- to our knowledge this has NEVER been reported in any centralized, easily accessible fashion.

What experience do you or your organization have to successfully develop this project?LesliesList.org was launched in the Chicago area on March 1, 2009. As of October 1, 2009 the site has had over 33,000 visits. The site’s founder, Dr. Leslie Ramirez, is a practicing primary care physician and clinical instructor at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. Dr. Ramirez was inspired to create the site after witnessing the hardships of her patients and her own uninsured family members. The site’s co-founder, Jeff Bailey, is a veteran business journalist with over 25 years experience reporting and editing for the Wall Street Journal, Crain’s Chicago Business, and the New York Times. LesliesList.org has been featured in both local and national media outlets, including the AMA News, Reach MD Satellite Radio, ABC Channel 7 News, WGN News, Negocios Now (Spanish language newspaper), and the Chicago Tribune.

site compares low costs of meds

Comment on this application:

wverkler said:

You are a hard-working person. You pay your bills on time and you try to provide for your family as best you can. You've been through economic ups and downs before. You're responsible. And then the floor dropped out from underneath you. Now, you are working two jobs and neither one of them offers you health care. As you sit on the el train on your way to the kind of job you had in high school (but you are grateful to have whatever you can get now), you pass through the rich variety of Chicago's neighborhoods. This is your community. This is your home. Wherever you go, though, you can sense it. This community is in trouble. Everyone you know is struggling with the same hard choices that now face you. You sit on the porch with your neighbor, pondering how you are going to afford the medicine for your daughter's strep throat. You don't know it, but this is your lucky day, the day that will make all the days ahead a little bit easier to get through.

wverkler said:

Your neighbor has endured a similar dilemma. She gives you a website she found when she was desperately searching for a way to pay for her mother's arthritis medicine. "Try Leslieslist.org," she tells you. You can find where to get the medicine you need at the lowest price. You don't have to choose between making the car payment and getting your daughter well. Once you visit the site, you know that, somehow, you ARE going to make it through these tough times. You don't have the know-how or resources to find the clinics with free testing or the stores with the lowest cost medication. But Leslieslist does. Get on the internet NOW, as soon as you read this post. Just enter the website and you have at your fingertips all the news and information, resources and recommendations you could hope for. The information is up-to-date; there is no charge to access this life-saver; and an illness in the family doesn't have to be a bank-breaker.

wverkler said:

Leslieslist.org exemplifies the best of Chicagoan's community spirit. It takes just one doctor who really cares, who is willing to put in the time and resources, and a thousand little changes are set in motion. They don't make the headlines, but every visit to this online resource represents one more family who can pay its bills, one less person "going without" tests or medicine. Lack of adequate heathcare is a sickness in this country, one that costs millions of dollars in bankruptcies, missed work days, and too-late treatments for illnesses that could have been minor had the person been able to go to a clinic. Leslieslist is a first step toward curing our diseased healthcare system. Maybe an affordable healthcare bill will get through; maybe it won't. If you need help RIGHT NOW, go to Leslieslist. It's lighting one candle in the darkness now, but hopefully, it will spread, and candles like this will spring to life all over the country.

ellenfrell said:

Leslie's List should have national application. It connects free-market economic competition to health care in such a way that everyone benefits. It cuts through the time-consuming, confusing process of finding affordable and appropriate medical information expeditiously. Because there is no profit motive for Leslie's List, this site deserves any foundation or back-up help it can receive. It is truly a public service, much needed.

bbrennan said:

Dr. Ramirez is providing an invaluable service for literally millions of people. She should be applauded as the best kind of American -- someone who is using her intellect and ability to benefit others. I applaud Leslie's List! She deserves the funding like no other!

caseorganic said:

It is a relief that this exists. I would be a regular user of this website as it would cut down the research that I have to do in order to get affordable healthcare and medication.

MonicaMM said:

This is truly an astounding effort! Americans will do price comparisons on line for everything from toilet paper to high end cars. The fact that we can't do it for medicines is shocking - especially given the huge price differences. This idea needs to be implemented in every single city in America!

edlin214 said:

I'm proud to say Dr. Ramirez is my physician, so I've always known her compassion and concern for her patients and the community. This is an invaluable resource for people who vitally need the information that is provided.

ldbrown said:

It is rare to find a physician who genuinely cares not only about her own patient's health but cares and is concerned about universal healthcare in the community. This website is what healthcare reform needs to address the issue of the uninsured's care and reasonable health care for everyone. Kudos to Dr. Ramirez and co-founder Jeff Bailey for their collaboration in a service that will affect the healthcare decisions of people from all walks of life. In my referrals to family and friends the feedback I receive is always one of appreciation for having the information to make common sense choices. This project is most deserving of 5 stars for the impact it will have in saving people's lives.

MargaretScott said:

A truly great idea that has the potential to change lives. How many bankruptcies could be prevented if people could accurately limit unanticipated healthcare expendutires.