When it comes to health care reform, we won't get anywhere until we become the customers again and can make informed decisions about our medical treatment based on transparent pricing.

To that end, the Cleveland Clinic has teamed up with private enterprises to develop a method to price whatever non-emergent care you need based on your insurance policy.

Their proprietary pricing tool is only available through participating insurers on their corporate intranet sites at the moment. Eventually, however, it will be available for other individuals, including small businesses. When a website becomes available, we'll share it with you.

Clark believes if we're more exposed to the cost of our medical care, it will make big difference in what we spend.

A recent story in The New York Times supports his belief. The paper reports that the state of Indiana has a high-deductible plan and another that's a traditional HMO. People in the high-deductible plan spend thousands less than those in the HMO.

"The average expense in 2009 for patients on one of these [high-deductible] plans was $6,393," the paper writes, "compared with $8,570 for patients on a more traditional health maintenance organization plan."

Here's the upshot: When we're treated like adults and empowered to make decisions about our health care, then the savings happen.

Unfortunately, our nation's new health care reform law does little in this respect. So regardless of where you stand on this key initiative of Pres. Obama's administration, we're nowhere until we can become the customers again.