fee-for-service

noun

fee-for-ser·​vice ˌfē-fər-ˈsər-vəs 

often attributive

: separate payment to a health care provider for each medical service rendered to a patient

Examples of fee-for-service in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Many healthcare organizations are still tied to traditional fee-for-service models, and switching to VBC requires significant investments in new technologies, infrastructure and training. —Arpan Saxena, Forbes, 20 Mar. 2025

Today’s fee-for-service system pays clinicians for volume, not value. —Robert Pearl, Forbes, 10 Mar. 2025

In Kennedy’s view, Americans are not uniquely beset by a privatized fee-for-service labyrinth characterized by administrative bloat, scant price regulation, a hospital system hollowed out by private equity, and rampant, grotesque greed. —Jessica Winter, The New Yorker, 8 Mar. 2025

Hospitals make money from fee-for-service health care. —Miles Bryan, Vox, 30 Jan. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1945, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for fee-for-service

• interservice
• disservice
• preservice
• nervous
• nervus

Medical Definition

fee-for-service

noun

fee-for-ser·​vice ˌfē-fər-ˈsər-vəs 

: separate payment to a health-care provider for each medical service rendered to a patient

—often used attributively

a fee-for-service group plan