If I go to the vet they provide me options for treatment and what each procedure will cost. If I go to the hospital no one can tell me how much my treatment will cost. This is mostly due to costs being controlled by so many insurance companies and other intermediaries.
The healthcare industry needs to provide transparency to its consumers: patients.
If each insurance company (or other intermediary) were required to submit what they'll pay (or what percentage they'll pay) for each type of visit, consumable and procedure, then the national database could provide hospitals a front-end whereby a hospital employee would be able to select the item from the database of their hospital's costs, select the patient's insurance, and calculate a final cost to present to the patient.