FAIR Health Research 2025
December 16, 2025
FAIR Health continues to publish original data studies that explore healthcare-related issues. Topics of this year’s studies included obesity and GLP-1 drugs, as well as place of service trends and medical pricing. In addition, we continued annual updates to the Opioid Tracker and Cost of Giving Birth Tracker, and monthly updates to the Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker. We also released an infographic on FAIR Health consumer website usage statistics, as well as three briefs: on the updated Opioid Tracker, shared decision making and the latest series of six-month trending reports based on the Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker.
FAIR Health, The FAIR Health Opioid Tracker 2025: A User’s Guide, A FAIR Health Brief, September 30, 2025.
This brief is a user’s guide to the 2025 edition of the FAIR Health Opioid Tracker. It includes a guide to the findings presented in the national infographics. Among those findings: Nationally, among the commercially insured population, patients with opioid use disorder diagnoses showed an overall increase from 2021 to 2024. In 2021, there were 386 patients with opioid use disorder diagnoses per 100,000 patients, while in 2024 there were 539, an increase of 39.8 percent.
FAIR Health, Shared Decision-Making Tools for Older Adults in a Clinical Setting: Insights from a Learning Exchange with Healthcare Providers, A FAIR Health Brief, June 4, 2025.
In this brief, FAIR Health presented salient findings and lessons garnered from an online learning exchange session in March 2025 with clinicians and project leaders at each of four Age-Friendly Health Systems sites who were using and helping to evaluate FAIR Health’s healthcare engagement and shared decision-making tools at the clinical point of care. Among the key insights shared by the clinicians: Shared decision-making tools can clarify the implications of different treatments.
FAIR Health, Obesity and GLP-1 Drugs: A Claims-Based Analysis, A FAIR Health White Paper, May 27, 2025.
This white paper examined trends in obesity and GLP-1 drug prescriptions among adult patients during the period 2019-2024. The study focused on trends in diagnosis of overweight, obesity and type 2 diabetes, as well as GLP-1 drugs and other obesity treatment options (including bariatric surgery and behavioral health services). The study found that over two percent of commercially insured adult patients now take a GLP-1 drug to treat overweight or obesity.
FAIR Health, Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker Trending Reports July-December 2024: A User’s Guide, A FAIR Health Brief, April 22, 2025.
This brief offered a user’s guide to the Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker Trending Reports, a set of infographics that show national and regional six-month trends in telehealth. This second edition covered telehealth trends from July to December 2024. Among the findings: Mental health conditions ranked as the number one telehealth diagnostic category nationally and in all regions.
FAIR Health, FH® Healthcare Indicators and FH® Medical Price Index 2025: An Annual View of Place of Service Trends and Medical Pricing, A FAIR Health White Paper, March 31, 2025.
This white paper was the eighth annual edition to cover place of service trends and medical prices. The report showed that retail clinic and urgent care center utilization each decreased 12 percent nationally from 2022 to 2023. In terms of medical pricing, from November 2023 to November 2024, of six procedure categories, pathology and laboratory had the greatest percent increase in charge amount index, six percent.
FAIR Health, fairhealthconsumer.org Usage Statistics 2024, A FAIR Health Infographic, February 2025.
This infographic was the latest annual presentation of year-end statistics on the usage of FAIR Health Consumer, FAIR Health’s award-winning consumer website. The analyses included top medical and dental search terms, the age and gender of users, top user locations, top decision aids, most popular educational topics and most frequently visited total treatment cost bundles. Among the findings: In 2024, adults 65 and older became the largest age group of website users, making up 22 percent of the total.
Opioid Tracker
On September 30, FAIR Health released the third annual edition of its free, interactive Opioid Tracker, which tracks opioid use disorder state by state. A national heat map represents patients with opioid use disorder diagnoses per 100,000 commercially insured patients receiving medical services in 2024 for each state. Clicking on a state displays an infographic for that state with opioid use disorder data from 2024. The infographic includes the top five procedure code categories by utilization, the top five procedure codes by aggregate allowed amounts, the change in the number of patients with opioid use disorder diagnoses per 100,000 patients from 2021 to 2024, and the distribution of patients by age and gender. There is also a similar infographic for the nation as a whole, along with a second national infographic showing the top five states for opioid use disorder, the fastest-growing specialties, the distribution of places of service, and service type (professional versus facility) as a percentage of total allowed amounts.
Cost of Giving Birth Tracker
On June 17, FAIR Health released the third annual edition of its free, interactive Cost of Giving Birth Tracker, which tracks the cost of giving birth state by state. It consists of heat maps that show state-specific and national median charge and allowed amounts for vaginal deliveries and C-sections. Included in the data are inpatient and outpatient facility and professional costs. Services include the delivery itself (e.g., pharmacy, nursery, labor and delivery room, medical and surgical supplies, room and board for the mother), anesthesia, fetal nonstress tests, ultrasounds, laboratory work and a breast pump. Last updated in June 2024 with data from September 2023, the Cost of Giving Birth Tracker is now updated with data from the September 2024 release of the vaginal delivery and C-section FH® Total Treatment Cost benchmarks.
Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker
The Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker uses FAIR Health data to track how telehealth is evolving from month to month. An interactive map of the four US census regions allows the user to view an infographic on telehealth in a specific month in the nation as a whole or in individual regions. Beginning in January 2025, most of the charts are based on commercially insured patients with a telehealth claim. These include top five diagnostic categories, top five procedure categories, urban versus rural telehealth usage, age distribution and percent of patients with a telehealth claim. Continuing from previous years is a chart showing telehealth’s percentage of medical claim lines.