> Judah wrote: > pilots, on the other hand, don't sit down and help you decide if you > need to go to NYC or not. They don't decide whether it would be better > to have a layover in Minneapolis or Houston. Etc, etc.
Travel agents do. And presumably the traveler has done research before hand to known whom they'd like to work with on that consultation or possibly avoid consultation all together by doing upfront research and selecting, say, JetBlue due to it's all first-class seats vs USAir that has shitty seats. A330s, btw, have a 2-5-2 configuration for economy while DC-10s have a 3-8-3. So, for me, air travel is far from a commodity. For you it is. But these definitions are subjective and drift from the points are these: (1.) Even if we say medical services are not commodities like, say, oranges, my bet is that most consumers treat their medical services worse than commodities when it comes to selection. That is, they perform very little up front analysis, get very few second opinions, and do very little research. (2.) Even if consumers wanted to compare doctors and costs, they can't as no standard measures exist and no services (that I know of) exist to review and rank doctors and hospitals based on any defined criteria. Most people on this list know great sites to compare flights or even destinations using your example; but they know of no web sites to compare doctors or hospitals. Businesses like Carol.com have mostly failed thus far. Redbrickhealth.com is just getting going. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:299751 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
