Hospital Bills
Why Americans Are Drowning in Medical Debt
After his recent herniated-disk surgery, Peter Drier was ready for the $56,000 hospital charge, the $4,300 anesthesiologist bill, and the $133,000 fee for orthopedist. All were either in-network under his insurance or had been previously negotiated. But as Elisabeth Rosenthal recently explained in her great New York Times piece, he wasn’t quite prepared for a $117,000 bill from an “assistant surgeon”—an out-of-network doctor that the hospital tacked on at the last minute.
Who’s going to pay? The average cost to treat an Ebola patient could run as high as half a million dollars
Caring for Thomas Eric Duncan, the Dallas Ebola patient, may cost as much as $500,000, a bill that his hospital is unlikely to ever collect. Duncan is in critical condition at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, where he has been isolated since Sept. 28.
Scam Alert: Hospitals All Over America Are Wildly Inflating Medical Bills
The next time you visit a hospital, it is your wallet that may end up hurting the most. All over the United States, it has become common practice for hospitals to wildly inflate medical bills. For example, it has been reported that some hospitals are charging up to 30 dollars for a single aspirin pill.
After Surgery, Surprise $117,000 Medical Bill From Doctor He Didn’t Know
Before his three-hour neck surgery for herniated disks in December, Peter Drier, 37, signed a pile of consent forms. A bank technology manager who had researched his insurance coverage, Mr. Drier was prepared when the bills started arriving: