How it works
Why is a price missing? ("blank is never zero")
A blank price means the hospital didn't publish a rate for that combination of procedure and payer — it is never displayed as $0, because $0 would falsely suggest the service is free.
Example
If a hospital's file has no negotiated rate between itself and "Cigna PPO" for an MRI, this site shows "not published by hospital" in that cell — not $0, not a dash.