Four in 10 privately insured patients faced surprise medical bills after visiting emergency rooms or getting admitted to hospitals in 2016, according to a new study published Monday in the American Medical Association’s internal medicine journal.
The average price tag for a surprise bill related to care at an emergency department was $628 in 2016, up from $220 in 2010, according to the study. The average surprise bill for inpatient admissions increased from $804 in 2010 to $2,040 in 2016.
Patients can face surprise bills when they visit an emergency room covered by their insurance, but are treated by doctors who are not. Out-of-network doctors can bill patients for what insurance doesn’t cover, resulting in a surprise bill.
Read more at The Hill.
{Matzav.com}
You can keep your doctor.
This is a true story with one exception! I wasn’t asked nor included in the study!
Our insurance companies have become a disaster in this area. That they decide which treatment we’re entitled, not the examining doctor is bad enough. Some stupid office girl or dumb computer programmed to reject decide our treatment is one issue but that we get tagged on all kinds of additional charges above the stupid and oppressive co-pay system is crazy! After you come home, 30, 40, 50 days later you get a statement that there are charges that the insurance company didn’t pay and the doctor’s PAID collection agency comes after you. It’s sick and getting sicker, as Bob Grant used to say! It’s really sick! And this is even with high premium insurance plans.
Sick and getting sicker, indeed!