Exactly. Some hospitals charge $100 for a bag of normal IV saline., when it only costs them like $15! It’s more forgivable when a not-for-profit hospital does it, but not a for-profit conglomerate.
@@SHSPVR I've been to the emergency probably 15 times the past ten years, not a penny. And yet your country has people screaming against healthcare for all. I'd be miserable, broke and likely a lot more unhealthy. We all would here. This is on your voters.
@@silvertone1 you're absolutely right. I have a friend in the UK with chronic health conditions, has been hospitalized numerous times. She lives frugally, but would be destitute if she lived here and was bankrupted by bills and copays.
It's a for profit business. Supply and demand. You want it, you pay for it. That's the Conservative model. They can't make it affordable and make a profitable at the same time. That's bad business. Healthcare for everyone would be socialism. You don't want that. Survival of the richest, that's the Capitalist way!
They are already understaffed. How many people want to become doctors? People go to the hospital for the smallest reasons so why wouldn't they charge more while being overworked?
This is the result of FOR PROFIT medicine. Company's have to have money for the shareholders every year and those shareholders want more than last year every year.
@@Chicago48include the fees in test so the insurance will pay for them. Two kids with type one diabetes probably won't meet the deductible in a year of visits at four a year. I will never meet mine unless I have a catastrophic illness.
We had a chance to fix healthcare in 2008, but our government instead chose to guaranty health insurance companies a minimum profit on the insurance that every is now forced to buy. The ACA was written by the health insurance lobby, and passed unilaterally by the political party in charge at the time.
Um, it's a business. They can reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. Oh wait, no. Not yet. That's that pesky Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, but once it's repealed then it's pay or you don't stay. No socialist medical treatment for all B.S. Once there is no legal limitation it's all "pay for play" baby. That'll thin the herd.
Ooooh, I was charged a facility fee for... get this... a telemedicine appointment. This Zoom chat lasted 9 minutes. I've been disputing since February.
That's ridiculous! We used to be able to call a doctor's office to say, hey I have a UTI AGAIN. They'd send meds. Then you had messaging through the system. They'd send meds. Now you have to do an "electronic visit" where you fill out a form saying what you said in the message, so they can charge you $36 for reading the message and ordering the med. It's takes literally minutes to read and send. The cost just isn't justified.
@@TH-bx9qb Its all on you people who insist on using apps because you're too lazy to go down in person. Corporations took advantage big time and they still are. Amazon is more expensive than stores now but does anyone switch back? Nope,. Too lazy.
I have no cost for doctor appointments. When the telephone appointments started up during covid my insurance didn't pay my bill. I fought it for 5 months, then just paid it to get rid of the stress. I'm sure it's common practice for insurance companies to hold out knowing a percentage of patients will eventually pay to get it over with.
The nonprofit hospital chain near me is the one buying up practice groups and charging the facility fees. (Nonprofits and for profits use the same billing codes and techniques)
I'd love to see much of our Health care system put on Indian Reservations to eliminate all the MANDATED garbage of ACA which is actually CACA {Can't Afford Care Act}
Bingo. You are catching on quick. As soon as Trump repeals the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, the idea of socialized medicine will be over. For profit all the way! Capitalism.
This need to be banned because you are not being seen in the hospital setting you are being seen in a doctor's office. This is the reasoning why people do not go and take care of themselves because they can't afford it even with insurance
Yeah, $5.00 to be given 1 Tylenol pill while in the hospital. Tell me they aren’t making any money. Maybe rethink the salary of the CEO/CFO and you’d get back some money for operating expenses.
It's no different than a $5 towel fee at a resort. You are paying for the convenience. Plus, they have to make money. Healthcare in this country is a for profit industry, not a socialist government program. Who wants that?
Ohh Texas children's hospital is a very dirty bird. My mother worked for their billing department for decades and she would reject fees that couldn't be charged that the hospital tried to charge for. Plus while my daughter was under their care they would hospitalized her for weeks at a time for unnecessary reasons. I fired them and moved her to memorial children's hospital and she was never admitted overnight during the years of care she received there. TCH said she would be on dialysis within 3 months of her diagnosis...she didn't need dialysis for 3yrs with MHCH. Mind you we had amazing insurance with ,my daughter, my cousin on the other hand had medicaid and they discharged him with pneumonia while he was in for a GI consult. We requested a respiratory doctor to see him but that never happened and he went into cardiac arrest the next day and subsequently died from it at ben Taub. He spent his last months in an Iron lung, because they couldn't be bothered.
@@toosense I mean... those bills are unpaid because the prices are ridiculous. Not trying to attack you, it's just, if you go to a hospital and A) it's out of network or B) it IS in network and either haven't yet met your deductible or your insurance decides to not do their job and refuse to cover your medical expenses like they so often do, then you're stuck footing the bill.
@@emmahilburn1732 oh, I agree prices are ridiculous. I just paid $5k for a few tests. My point is that people not paying their bill is why the ones that do get stuck paying extra. even the negotiated insurance fees are very high.
Their all waiting in Austin to get a hold of the corrupt politicians, i.e., the attorney general and all the other GQP'ers who will handily accept cash from lobbyists from the industry. Scum bags, all of them.
If your only seeing the doctor in an office setting, the hospital should not be billing you. Challenge the fees with your insurance. That is illegal. Office place of service is 11. What did the hospital bill as a place of service? I work for a hospital doing billing in Ca & when Pt’s see a doctor at one of our own clinics we do not charge a facility fee.
This is why I never pick a physician whose office is close to a hospital. I have been noticing that the fees are higher than other regular medical offices.
In February, one month into my insurance contract, I received a letter saying my insurance might be dropping Multi-Care because their prices raised 50%-100% on hospital procedures. So despite PAYING for health insurance for the rest of the calendar year, I would be basically UNINSURED because all my doctors were Multi-Care in my area and now “out-of-network.” (AND THIS IS ENTIRELY LEGAL). What happened three months later? The hospital employees are striking because the hospital is paying them ridiculously low wages. …SO WHERE IS THE MONEY GOING??? WHY ARE HOSPITAL PROCEDURES DOUBLE AND WORKERS AREN’T PAID? CORPORATE GREED. We need more regulations and protections from the government. Why can I only sign up for new health insurance in November??? But my insurance can break their contract I signed at anytime and completely change the terms I signed up for??? Why are hospital and insurance costs allowed to price-gouge so much? Why are NECESSARY public goods FOR-PROFIT? How is that not a monopoly???
@aurelie8220, I’m pretty sure if your health insurance changed what it covers that’s considered a qualifying event which allows you to pick a new plan.
I would not live in the States if you paid me, your health system is a complete joke, Australia, and other countries their government has a good system in place and our health insurance companies are not greedy like the ones in the State, one of them bought into one of our health insurance companies and they tried to change it to work like does in the States, boy were they slapped down fast. My hubby and I ditched the company and found a fully owned Australian company.
@@dawsie then why do people LEAVE those systems to come to the US to get the medical procedures ? answer: it's because they have to WAIT months to even see a specialist, much less get the procedure done.
Seattle and some other place been doing that for decades now-I only know because I used to work in medical billing and lots of patients used to get livid over two bills from one doctor-and we had to tell them one is from doc and one is from office for use of the facility
They purposely take the non-profit title for the tax breaks, and it's not just property tax they don't pay. People tend to think a non-profit is the same as a charity. Not even close. It just means they use up all the money paying executives and investors.
I owe Childrens hospital almost $200k. My daughter was diagnosed with leukemia when she was 3. She’s 11. She’s Relapsed once so she’s spent 5.5 of her life on chemotherapy. Half of her life. We have blue cross blue shield as well. If she qualified for Medicaid we wouldn’t owe a dime. I was in the hospital pharmacy once and skimping on the number of syringes we picked up and trying to ask about generics when a lady came in behind me. She began to point and choose all sorts of stuff and was loudly talking about her plane trip for vacation. She was getting a pink cooler, all types of freezable packs and just whatever she picked up. I heard the cashier tell her that her Medicaid wouldn’t cover one of the little ice packs. I think the type that it was. She told the lady she owed $4.52. The lady turned into a Karen over the $4.52 and began to go off on the workers about how her kid needed everything she chose. This entire time I was kind of shoved off to the side and still waiting. The cashier called me forward to get me out of the way I suppose and that other lady kept going on and on about the stupid ice pack. I offered to pay for the thing and the lady went to thanking me profusely but the pharmacists came from behind the glass, snatched up the ice packs and replaced them with medical grade ice packs and said “absolutely not. We located what we needed for this customer and will not have to substitute for shelf items”. 😮 Lord she lost it at that point because she had a stack of cute ice packs and such. She told them they never had enough ice packs and they always let her substitute and that pharmacist said “then you should have plenty of the cute ones because those are reusable” 😂. We got our stuff and let. Moral of my story is that people who pay out of their own pockets are usually the ones covering the bills for those who don’t. I went to get into my 2010 Tahoe that’s paid for because we couldn’t afford a car payment but that lady loaded her child into a shiny new Escalade. She would have happily let me pay for her $5 ice pack without ever realizing my struggle. Sigh. Hospitals overcharge to cover those that don’t pay. Medicaid pays the hospital but only a tiny fraction of what is billed. The rest of us cover the slack.
The problem isn't that she has Medicaid. The issue is you don't have adequate coverage. You don't know why she cared so much for ice packs or why she was angry. Put blame where it's due. Everyone's doing their own thing
It's becoming impossible for private practices to survive all of the huge administrative fees including rising commercial rent, increased staff salaries, liability insurancce, business insurance, vendor fees, declining insurance reimbursements, insurance denials for already provided services, having to now "compete" with insurance-owned clinics, having to beg the insurance to approve every imaging test and every medication we prescribe, etc, etc, etc. I can't list all of the frustrations of practising medicine in the U.S. but suffice to say that "the goal" is to push the general public towards institutionalized medicine where rotating doctors will take care of you, you will learn how to not have a connection with your doctor which will make the eventual transition to atificial intelligence medicine that much smoother.
You don't need a connection with a doctor. I have a card that allows me to see any of THOUSANDS of doctors/specialists/hospitals for free the same day walk-in. I need healthcare free asap..not a friend.
@@silvertone1 - Why don’t you share with all of us what this card is that allows you to see THOUSANDS of doctors, specialists, hospitals, etc, etc, for free and on the same day. We’re all ears/eyes. And for the record, there isn’t anyone interested in having you as a friend. I needed to also add that just b/c you do not want to have a long term relationship with any particular doctor doesn’t mean that everyone feels the same way as you do. There are many ppl who desire that and make their first appointments with a particular doctor for that reason. Those ppl deserve to be catered to as well, IMO. The world doesn’t revolve around you alone.
@@aao449 More like the world doesn't revolve around you. Doctors studied for years, they aren't sitting around waiting for special you to show up. If you need one..go and see one...they are there every day waiting. If you particularly want a specific one, you go there. Its called a Medicare card btw duhh...lol.
@@silvertone1 - Ah yes, a Medicare card that allows you to walk into any medical building or office…b/c you’re so important and all services are free..Lol. You sound like you’d be an obnoxious pain in the neck to the staff anywhere you showed up.
I used to work for a health insurance company. You are very much exaggerating about imaging and meds. Most of the requests are auto appoved and don't need pre auth. The high cost imaging usually will need to preauth and some of the high cost meds will need to be too. I have seen docs want to order the newest imargery toy or meds that are high cost, when there are lower cost choices. It does take some extra time to get these pre auth. However, if you have an emergent or urgent situation, you have the ability to get the situation taken care of quickly without a preauth. If you are contracted with an HMO insurance plan, you know in advance what is required/processes are. So, you have the ability not to accept these plans or comply with the terms of your contract.
This is why I do not go to doctors. We never have had insurance and when I tried to have it they covered NOTHING to speak of and the doctors and all just find more whys to run the bills up! Poor people just do without care!
My local hospital wasn't getting reimbursed by insurance companies, for spinal surgeries. So instead of charging the patients more, the hospital simply shut down the spinal surgery rooms. Now, doctors, in four counties, have to do their spinal surgeries in one hospital. Now patients, who are in great pain, from a ruptured disc, have to wait months to get an appointment for surgery. And some doctors are getting charged too much for liability insurance. Even the doctors are frustrated. So after paying $838 per month for insurance coverage, and copays and deductibles, we can't get an appointment in over booked surgical rooms. So are the insurance companies greedy, or has the cost of surgery become too great even for insurance companies? And how much of this is due to endless lawsuits? And is any of this due to government corruption?
Lawsuits are rare, plantiffs rarely win, and most states have placed limits on award amounts. Texas is an example. After lowering the amount a plaintiff could receive to a relatively small amount, neither insurance or medical costs were lowered and both rose as fast as states who hadn't taken the same actions. It was and has been a smokescreen to hide greed.
This is the result of 'privatized' hospitals. They might say 'non-profit' in their description, but a 1965 law allows them to PROFIT, and they want to please their INVESTORS and could care less about the PATIENTS.
Wrong. Rich men and their insatiable greed are to blame. They own the healthcare system. And if you don't like Obamacare, why did you vote for repugs who refused to consider Medicare for all? You voted against your own best interests and now you must pay for your stupidity.
Imagine going shopping and being charged an entry fee, taking a train, bus etc and being charged to enter the station, or charged to use a chair and table in a restaurant! Crazy, it should be built into the cost of service .
Most of US medical care is provided by corporations which have investors that expect a high return. All medical bills, especially those from hospitals, get inflated to increase corporate profits.
Make big signs and picket the facilities. I did it to a bank and got the unfair fees reversed. I called the bank and told then I was going to do it. Then I did it. Then I called them and told them I did it. On the third day they reversed the fees.
Thats ridiculous!!! I just had cataract surgery and had to pay the doctor and facility up front after they confirmed with my insurance what they were going to pay with my deductible . Now, im getting texts and bills in the mail that i still owe more after i paid up front!!! I seen what the insurance paid and what i already paid, they got plenty from me being in there for a few hours for a uncomplicated procedure.
Check with your insurance company to see if the provider is allowed to balance bill. Most insurances do not allow their contracted providers to do this, as they already have predetermined rates.
It's time to get insurance out of health care. Then you will see how quickly things change, some formthe good and some for the bad. However, I think making insurance a mainstay of any system causes more problems than it solves.
I sent my doctors office a bill for the "Pleasure of having me as your patient" fee. It was exactly the same as any fee's over my co-pay. I haven't heard from them in a month. Guess I'll have to send them to collections.
Check the bills of your car dealorship or Midas etc for Office fees or Misc fees. You will faint at what you are being charged for. It was told to me that it covered "office supplies, gloves, rags, staples, pens, paper, oil, window glass cleaner, and much more. F'en robbery and there isn't a thing we as customers can do about it.
Because they are paying for those items and then in some states must pay state tax on those items. As a small business in NC every year we have to list all materials on hand as of January 1st on a property tax listing that we later pay tax on. Hospitals are trying to recoup their costs by adding these fees. Tell the states and federal government to lower taxes and get rid of fees which will save us money also.
@@zuzuspetals9281 It makes no sense at all to charge a percentage of a bill over and over all day every day on Office Supplies at a 1000percent profit. The same with the auto dealerships. Being charged a fee ON TOP of the repair cost to cover windex, rags, paper etc etc......What ever happened to placing a price on something that included overhead? That would be a profit after expenses etc. What about the Key formula used to set prices? Overhead is an expense. When you have a business you use a tax excempt number for business purposes and purchases. It all seems dirty business and underhanded to me. It is just a robber's way of stealing more. What a slap in the face of the customers.
Here is how I recently got burned even with insurance. Called my PCP. Was told his next available appointment was in 3 weeks!!!!????? (Why do I need a PCP if I can't get a timely appointment?) I was told by phone, "We have an affiliated urgent care staffed by a doctor that can see you today. " I got zapped with a bill that was 3 times higher than my PCP plus a facilities charge. All they did was look in my ears say I had an ear infection and prescribe antibiotics. Cost me $380 plus cost of antibiotics. I was there with the doctor for 5 minutes. 😠
Well, you see, the bean-counters that run your PCP’s office need to squeeze every penny out of your PCP and his colleagues so they stuff any many patients as possible into their daily schedules, leaving no available time for urgent/emergent, i.e. unscheduled, visits. A doctor who has deliberately empty slots in his schedule is a doctor not making enough money for said bean counters. Then they create a separate urgent care system to take care of all the unscheduled visits for which they do have to allow for the possibility of the urgent care docs not seeing patients EVERY available minute of the day, so they charge you extra to make up for those “losses”.
@@sarahann530 Basically every other country on the planet. US patients have been so brainwashed by the lobbyist and hedge funds that theirs is the only way. My daughter has lived in Australia for 6 years and has way better health care and employee rights. They have living wages and no, the food chains did not have to jack their prices way up. But they do not pay their upper management stupid salaries either. [and their worst coffee shops beats the US best ones hands down].
I’ve been paying these for a while. I get seen at a hospital and I’m there in a room not using any supplies. I sit in a chair, the dr walks in, we speak for about 10 mins, he’s gone and then I get charged about 75.00 just for the room. I’ve protested but got nowhere
This has been going on for several years. I used to work for a Health insurance company. The hospitals were charging these fees for outpatient services on hospital campuses. The last I heard, Medicare was working on a policy to not pay these fees.
Reminds me of a story of a woman who waited hours at an ER waitroom for hours for head trauma, and left without being seen. She received a hefty bill just for waiting for nothing.
This makes me so thankful for the UK’s NHS, I’ve recently had a blood test (routine for the meds I take), phone call from GP for an anomaly, second blood test + test kit. Then a consultation at our main hospital. The only fees are for the prescription charge (flat rate with some exemptions). Similar scenarios in the EU. The patients and families who need care have a few less worries.
That's been happening for many years. I'm 77 yrs old & took care of my parents for their last 25 years. I called the hospitals time and again, even went there once to show them they were overcharging my mother. They took it off.
Local hospital has this. Visited a sleep clinic for a consultation. Billed for NP who worked for the clinic, another for a NP who worked for the hospital (only one NP was necessary) and then by the hospital for the clinic’s office space. Always ask for full disclosure of billing before accepting service.
No, if the patient read the check in form they signed, it completely states that facility charges are separate charges. Patients wanted a complete disclosure of charges for medical bills which is why medical bills were broken into two fees…doctor and facility. It takes money to run a building: power, water, housekeepers, mechanical, plumbers, technology, electricity, cleaning supplies, medical tools, medical machines, receptionist … nothing is free! These are people who just sign documents without reading what they sign then complain when they get the bill. I have had multiple medical issues and it states on the checkin form I sign for every visit.
This happened to me 30 years ago. I just refused to pay. When I started getting phone calls from a collection agency, I still refused to pay. They finally stopped calling me.
After visit fees should be banned. Where else do you go for a service or purchase and, as an after thought, you get another bill in the mail? And one you have no idea about and how much it will be. I've had it happen so often, and we are not taking a few $$ but hundreds !!
None of the people treating patients know or even have access to that information at the time they are seeing patients in most hospitals. Then the insurance companies have negotiated fees with hospitals, which are all different from each other and many times different between different plans at the same insurance company. In short, there is no way for you or your physician to know what the fee will be until it bounces around between billing and insurance.
Hey, it happens in Round Rock too. We simply switched physicians, and warned the new ones what kinds of things annoyed us enough to leave our previous providers.
There is one other issue to bring up, Let's say you have a good HMO and you go in for an xray or CT scan and when finished your HMO pays there discounted rate to the facility you went to, for example your xray total cost before your HMO discount is say $150 and your HMO only pays the contracted amount of $100, well then your xray facility sends you a bill for $50.00. I never pay it because my insurance tells me I do not have to pay. One more pit fall of being retired
We are in a different state and the local-ish university hospital system is picking up on its facility fees. Whats the worst about it is that you ca t get anyone to tell you what they will be ahead of time. We have switched providers in some cases like what should have been free podiatry care was beeing charged a $200 per visit outpaitent sugery facility fee because sugical services are performed in the 6 story medical building. We have kept a few providers by opting for what are called remote clinic buildings some multiple miles away from buildings that offer services considered surgery; i think there are facility fees but they are covered by insurrance.
You are sent for yearly routine testing, then it’s up to you to get the results weeks later after going through taped messages only to discover they can’t help and you have to start over. You never see the same doctor so they don’t know your medical history. Turnover is so high that you don’t get to know anyone in reception. You leave messages and after a couple days with no call back you go through it again. You have to wait for an hour+ every time you go and then they want to tack on facility fee…I don’t think so. I was charged more than in the past at neurologist and when I questioned the front desk they said I had run over the 15 minutes (by 5 minutes) with the doctor, that billing is done by 15 min increments. I didn’t push on staff but I sent a letter directly to the doctor that I had been going to for 15 years and in the future I would be deducting from my bill for every 15 minutes I have to sit in waiting room. No call back but charge was reimbursed.
Here in Canada we have access to everything on our own files online..free of course..not charged per access, monthly or download like they'll do to you eventually. I got to see my brainscan, my mri's, my bloodwork results..all of it going back years so i can track my health. Its amazing!
Moved from Missouri to Laredo for my husbands family and needed a quick visit to get my son into daycare. Went to what we were told was the low income place to go and they charged us THREE HUNDRED dollars for a check up on 2 year old!!! I was floored!!!! I could pay like 90 out of pocket for my dr in Missouri! Wonder if this is what they did to charge such a crazy price!
I have been to hospital in Australia a number of times and I have NEVER been charged for anything like that, all hospital areas fall under the public health. They are not allowed to make a profit at the expense of the patent, that’s totally nuts.
Had a doctor send in a bill for a visit he supposedly did when my mother was in a nursing home. The date he said he saw her was 3 days after I buried her. She had died, and he was trying to bill Medicare for a visit that never occurred and makes me wonder how many bills Medicare paid to this crook.
This has been going on for a long time. I go to a hospital in the North, and I have always gone to the same doctors, but with the onset of the pandemic and afterwards, I have noticed a facility fee. I tried talking to someone about it, but they turn a deaf ear. And the bad part about it, the insurance companies don't challenge them, they just pay it. So, if they are getting paid, why not continue. Then they wonder why your ins, premiums are so high.
Start charging 'Patient Access Fees' at double their rate. Tack on 'On Time Fee' and 'Delay of Treatment Penalty' also wear and tear on shoe leather and pants seat fabrics.
Hospitals already have an 8000% markup over cost on everything.
Exactly. Some hospitals charge $100 for a bag of normal IV saline., when it only costs them like $15! It’s more forgivable when a not-for-profit hospital does it, but not a for-profit conglomerate.
Yep you're not joking about that one trip to the emergency room called over 11K which is freaking ridiculous
@@SHSPVR I've been to the emergency probably 15 times the past ten years, not a penny. And yet your country has people screaming against healthcare for all. I'd be miserable, broke and likely a lot more unhealthy. We all would here. This is on your voters.
@@silvertone1 you're absolutely right. I have a friend in the UK with chronic health conditions, has been hospitalized numerous times. She lives frugally, but would be destitute if she lived here and was bankrupted by bills and copays.
@@silvertone1 corporations do a good job confusing Americans. They spend billions of dollars lobbying to get what they want.
New level of GREED.
It's a for profit business. Supply and demand. You want it, you pay for it. That's the Conservative model. They can't make it affordable and make a profitable at the same time. That's bad business. Healthcare for everyone would be socialism. You don't want that. Survival of the richest, that's the Capitalist way!
Profit system vs health care.
@@irwinsaltzman979 Government oversight needed
Neither health care nor prisons should be "for profit" businesses. It's disgraceful, the level of greed in this country.
Read my comment.
But thanks to Regan (who also closed down every single mental health hospital driving up our homeless population) everything is now privatized
That way we can train people on unemployment to br drs.
Agreed and I've been saying this since I was a kid. It continues to be disgraceful and it will continue to get worse.
So tru Patsy! What a sad state humanities found itself in
What isn’t corrupt these days?
We have a President that is leading by example.
@@alfr1nope we got rid of the BIGOT
Everything has it's price.
Nature. She don’t give a damn what you do
I don't understand why, In This Day and Age, people receiving medical care are called *_"patients",_* when they are clearly *_"customers"._*
Exactly! Now you're talking. Pay for play baby; the capitalist way.
Because doctors and admin think they are God while 'patients' is code for peon.
Well said
You're correct. we are customers and we have choices. Again, Texas comes through at the greediest state in the union.
@@nancyenkelmann4552 Not as greedy as Kentucky....
The greed of the medical community is disgraceful.
They are already understaffed. How many people want to become doctors? People go to the hospital for the smallest reasons so why wouldn't they charge more while being overworked?
This is the result of FOR PROFIT medicine. Company's have to have money for the shareholders every year and those shareholders want more than last year every year.
This is the USA, what do you expect?
Not the medical community ,doctors and nurses don’t make prices, the Medical Industry has become a callous money machine
Can't afford pets, either because of the costs. ..vets. I just want a black cat.
It's time to put the healthcare industry on notice, these should be considered crimes against humanity. Seriously.
Remember, the hospitals HAVE to hire and pay doctors and nurses. Labor costs are high, that's what soaking up the budgets.
@@Chicago48we don’t need the fees for them they can work for free
@@Chicago48include the fees in test so the insurance will pay for them. Two kids with type one diabetes probably won't meet the deductible in a year of visits at four a year. I will never meet mine unless I have a catastrophic illness.
We had a chance to fix healthcare in 2008, but our government instead chose to guaranty health insurance companies a minimum profit on the insurance that every is now forced to buy. The ACA was written by the health insurance lobby, and passed unilaterally by the political party in charge at the time.
Um, it's a business. They can reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. Oh wait, no. Not yet. That's that pesky Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, but once it's repealed then it's pay or you don't stay. No socialist medical treatment for all B.S. Once there is no legal limitation it's all "pay for play" baby. That'll thin the herd.
Ooooh, I was charged a facility fee for... get this... a telemedicine appointment. This Zoom chat lasted 9 minutes. I've been disputing since February.
And it costs more than a nights stay at a luxury hotel.
That's ridiculous! We used to be able to call a doctor's office to say, hey I have a UTI AGAIN. They'd send meds. Then you had messaging through the system. They'd send meds. Now you have to do an "electronic visit" where you fill out a form saying what you said in the message, so they can charge you $36 for reading the message and ordering the med. It's takes literally minutes to read and send. The cost just isn't justified.
@@TH-bx9qb Its all on you people who insist on using apps because you're too lazy to go down in person. Corporations took advantage big time and they still are. Amazon is more expensive than stores now but does anyone switch back? Nope,. Too lazy.
I have no cost for doctor appointments. When the telephone appointments started up during covid my insurance didn't pay my bill. I fought it for 5 months, then just paid it to get rid of the stress. I'm sure it's common practice for insurance companies to hold out knowing a percentage of patients will eventually pay to get it over with.
I believe it 😢
This is the result of "Privatization" of hospitals. Corporate concerns are the bottom line.
Exactly, it's a business. Healthcare is a privilege, not a right.
Gotta keep the shareholders happy F your children!
The nonprofit hospital chain near me is the one buying up practice groups and charging the facility fees. (Nonprofits and for profits use the same billing codes and techniques)
I'd love to see much of our Health care system put on Indian Reservations to eliminate all the MANDATED garbage of ACA which is actually CACA {Can't Afford Care Act}
@@mikewurlitzer5217 ...speak English much? Oh I'm sorry, 'Merican?
If the office isn't physically connected to the Hospital, it shouldn't be considered "part of the hospital ".
Especially if the same equipment and specialist are not available at these satellite “facilities.”
these fee's will push more ppl away from seeking help due to it would be to expensive to seek help
Yep. Welcome to capitalism.
Bet you the illegals don`t pay for anything!!
fee's?
Why did you add an apostrophe?
Bingo. You are catching on quick. As soon as Trump repeals the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, the idea of socialized medicine will be over. For profit all the way! Capitalism.
Very true
Another Junk Fee!
Buying up private practices will not end well.
Capitalism is supposed to work because of competition. Republicans got rid of that and are aiding in consolidating business in the hands of the few.
This need to be banned because you are not being seen in the hospital setting you are being seen in a doctor's office.
This is the reasoning why people do not go and take care of themselves because they can't afford it even with insurance
Yeah, $5.00 to be given 1 Tylenol pill while in the hospital. Tell me they aren’t making any money. Maybe rethink the salary of the CEO/CFO and you’d get back some money for operating expenses.
Especially to the nurses and other front-liners.
It's no different than a $5 towel fee at a resort. You are paying for the convenience. Plus, they have to make money. Healthcare in this country is a for profit industry, not a socialist government program. Who wants that?
Definitely management salaries are a major source of this problem. Fewer threats would be helpful.
$5? You got a deal!
Fifteen dollars for gurney sheet on top of 1500 ambulance fee..HEALTH care in US is nothing about HEALTH and Corporations Dont CARE...
Ohh Texas children's hospital is a very dirty bird. My mother worked for their billing department for decades and she would reject fees that couldn't be charged that the hospital tried to charge for. Plus while my daughter was under their care they would hospitalized her for weeks at a time for unnecessary reasons. I fired them and moved her to memorial children's hospital and she was never admitted overnight during the years of care she received there. TCH said she would be on dialysis within 3 months of her diagnosis...she didn't need dialysis for 3yrs with MHCH. Mind you we had amazing insurance with ,my daughter, my cousin on the other hand had medicaid and they discharged him with pneumonia while he was in for a GI consult. We requested a respiratory doctor to see him but that never happened and he went into cardiac arrest the next day and subsequently died from it at ben Taub. He spent his last months in an Iron lung, because they couldn't be bothered.
F that noise. No hospital fees for non hospital visits.
Uh, Doc, meet me and the kids in the parking lot for the exam.
Hospital now days is not bout helping people anymore it's do u have money now
Probably because they get stuck with tons of unpaid bills.
@@toosense I mean... those bills are unpaid because the prices are ridiculous. Not trying to attack you, it's just, if you go to a hospital and A) it's out of network or B) it IS in network and either haven't yet met your deductible or your insurance decides to not do their job and refuse to cover your medical expenses like they so often do, then you're stuck footing the bill.
@@emmahilburn1732 oh, I agree prices are ridiculous. I just paid $5k for a few tests. My point is that people not paying their bill is why the ones that do get stuck paying extra. even the negotiated insurance fees are very high.
Not with the NHS
Unless you're an illegal, then you get it free
Have to love the lobbyists filling the pockets of the politicians
Their all waiting in Austin to get a hold of the corrupt politicians, i.e., the attorney general and all the other GQP'ers who will handily accept cash from lobbyists from the industry. Scum bags, all of them.
If your only seeing the doctor in an office setting, the hospital should not be billing you. Challenge the fees with your insurance. That is illegal. Office place of service is 11. What did the hospital bill as a place of service? I work for a hospital doing billing in Ca & when Pt’s see a doctor at one of our own clinics we do not charge a facility fee.
This is why I never pick a physician whose office is close to a hospital. I have been noticing that the fees are higher than other regular medical offices.
I hate third party billing too
Greed and Corruption is #1 in the USA.
In February, one month into my insurance contract, I received a letter saying my insurance might be dropping Multi-Care because their prices raised 50%-100% on hospital procedures. So despite PAYING for health insurance for the rest of the calendar year, I would be basically UNINSURED because all my doctors were Multi-Care in my area and now “out-of-network.” (AND THIS IS ENTIRELY LEGAL).
What happened three months later? The hospital employees are striking because the hospital is paying them ridiculously low wages.
…SO WHERE IS THE MONEY GOING??? WHY ARE HOSPITAL PROCEDURES DOUBLE AND WORKERS AREN’T PAID?
CORPORATE GREED.
We need more regulations and protections from the government.
Why can I only sign up for new health insurance in November??? But my insurance can break their contract I signed at anytime and completely change the terms I signed up for??? Why are hospital and insurance costs allowed to price-gouge so much? Why are NECESSARY public goods FOR-PROFIT? How is that not a monopoly???
@aurelie8220, I’m pretty sure if your health insurance changed what it covers that’s considered a qualifying event which allows you to pick a new plan.
I would not live in the States if you paid me, your health system is a complete joke, Australia, and other countries their government has a good system in place and our health insurance companies are not greedy like the ones in the State, one of them bought into one of our health insurance companies and they tried to change it to work like does in the States, boy were they slapped down fast. My hubby and I ditched the company and found a fully owned Australian company.
@@dawsie then why do people LEAVE those systems to come to the US to get the medical procedures ? answer: it's because they have to WAIT months to even see a specialist, much less get the procedure done.
This is what happens when hospitals are not non-profit. Their priority is making their share holders money.
This is total BS!
Seems they’re copying Ticketmaster’s service charge.
I wish the actual government would regulate these crooks
republicans are in control in texas and they don't see a problem w these fees and apparently neither do their voters
Well, it would be considered moving towards “socialized” healthcare. Which, I guess scares people more than going bankrupt. 🤷♂️
@carly_j8011 maybe regulate without paying for it so people can pay themselves
We have the best government money can buy.
@@carly_j8011practically everybody I talk to about healthcare wants a national healthcare system. I can't remember anybody being against an NHS.
What about the use of gravity fee ,putting your feet on the floor fee,breathing the facility air?
Don't give them any ideas!
Seattle and some other place been doing that for decades now-I only know because I used to work in medical billing and lots of patients used to get livid over two bills from one doctor-and we had to tell them one is from doc and one is from office for use of the facility
They do this at UPMC medical here in PA. While they rake in millions and millions they have non profit status and don't pay a dime in property taxes.
They purposely take the non-profit title for the tax breaks, and it's not just property tax they don't pay. People tend to think a non-profit is the same as a charity. Not even close. It just means they use up all the money paying executives and investors.
The greed nowadays is horrendous
Greedy people plus corrupt politicians give you this
Outrageous.
I owe Childrens hospital almost $200k. My daughter was diagnosed with leukemia when she was 3. She’s 11. She’s Relapsed once so she’s spent 5.5 of her life on chemotherapy. Half of her life. We have blue cross blue shield as well.
If she qualified for Medicaid we wouldn’t owe a dime. I was in the hospital pharmacy once and skimping on the number of syringes we picked up and trying to ask about generics when a lady came in behind me. She began to point and choose all sorts of stuff and was loudly talking about her plane trip for vacation. She was getting a pink cooler, all types of freezable packs and just whatever she picked up. I heard the cashier tell her that her Medicaid wouldn’t cover one of the little ice packs. I think the type that it was. She told the lady she owed $4.52. The lady turned into a Karen over the $4.52 and began to go off on the workers about how her kid needed everything she chose. This entire time I was kind of shoved off to the side and still waiting. The cashier called me forward to get me out of the way I suppose and that other lady kept going on and on about the stupid ice pack. I offered to pay for the thing and the lady went to thanking me profusely but the pharmacists came from behind the glass, snatched up the ice packs and replaced them with medical grade ice packs and said “absolutely not. We located what we needed for this customer and will not have to substitute for shelf items”. 😮
Lord she lost it at that point because she had a stack of cute ice packs and such. She told them they never had enough ice packs and they always let her substitute and that pharmacist said “then you should have plenty of the cute ones because those are reusable” 😂. We got our stuff and let.
Moral of my story is that people who pay out of their own pockets are usually the ones covering the bills for those who don’t.
I went to get into my 2010 Tahoe that’s paid for because we couldn’t afford a car payment but that lady loaded her child into a shiny new Escalade.
She would have happily let me pay for her $5 ice pack without ever realizing my struggle.
Sigh.
Hospitals overcharge to cover those that don’t pay. Medicaid pays the hospital but only a tiny fraction of what is billed. The rest of us cover the slack.
The problem isn't that she has Medicaid. The issue is you don't have adequate coverage. You don't know why she cared so much for ice packs or why she was angry. Put blame where it's due. Everyone's doing their own thing
This another example of corporate greed.
Exactly
24 and i havent been to the doctors since i was 17. I have no insurance
Endless gouging.
Always ask for an itemized bill
It's becoming impossible for private practices to survive all of the huge administrative fees including rising commercial rent, increased staff salaries, liability insurancce, business insurance, vendor fees, declining insurance reimbursements, insurance denials for already provided services, having to now "compete" with insurance-owned clinics, having to beg the insurance to approve every imaging test and every medication we prescribe, etc, etc, etc.
I can't list all of the frustrations of practising medicine in the U.S. but suffice to say that "the goal" is to push the general public towards institutionalized medicine where rotating doctors will take care of you, you will learn how to not have a connection with your doctor which will make the eventual transition to atificial intelligence medicine that much smoother.
You don't need a connection with a doctor. I have a card that allows me to see any of THOUSANDS of doctors/specialists/hospitals for free the same day walk-in. I need healthcare free asap..not a friend.
@@silvertone1 - Why don’t you share with all of us what this card is that allows you to see THOUSANDS of doctors, specialists, hospitals, etc, etc, for free and on the same day. We’re all ears/eyes. And for the record, there isn’t anyone interested in having you as a friend.
I needed to also add that just b/c you do not want to have a long term relationship with any particular doctor doesn’t mean that everyone feels the same way as you do. There are many ppl who desire that and make their first appointments with a particular doctor for that reason. Those ppl deserve to be catered to as well, IMO. The world doesn’t revolve around you alone.
@@aao449 More like the world doesn't revolve around you. Doctors studied for years, they aren't sitting around waiting for special you to show up. If you need one..go and see one...they are there every day waiting. If you particularly want a specific one, you go there. Its called a Medicare card btw duhh...lol.
@@silvertone1 - Ah yes, a Medicare card that allows you to walk into any medical building or office…b/c you’re so important and all services are free..Lol.
You sound like you’d be an obnoxious pain in the neck to the staff anywhere you showed up.
I used to work for a health insurance company. You are very much exaggerating about imaging and meds. Most of the requests are auto appoved and don't need pre auth. The high cost imaging usually will need to preauth and some of the high cost meds will need to be too.
I have seen docs want to order the newest imargery toy or meds that are high cost, when there are lower cost choices. It does take some extra time to get these pre auth. However, if you have an emergent or urgent situation, you have the ability to get the situation taken care of quickly without a preauth.
If you are contracted with an HMO insurance plan, you know in advance what is required/processes are. So, you have the ability not to accept these plans or comply with the terms of your contract.
This is why I do not go to doctors. We never have had insurance and when I tried to have it they covered NOTHING to speak of and the doctors and all just find more whys to run the bills up! Poor people just do without care!
My local hospital wasn't getting reimbursed by insurance companies, for spinal surgeries. So instead of charging the patients more, the hospital simply shut down the spinal surgery rooms. Now, doctors, in four counties, have to do their spinal surgeries in one hospital. Now patients, who are in great pain, from a ruptured disc, have to wait months to get an appointment for surgery. And some doctors are getting charged too much for liability insurance. Even the doctors are frustrated. So after paying $838 per month for insurance coverage, and copays and deductibles, we can't get an appointment in over booked surgical rooms. So are the insurance companies greedy, or has the cost of surgery become too great even for insurance companies? And how much of this is due to endless lawsuits? And is any of this due to government corruption?
Thank Obamacare
Lawsuits are rare, plantiffs rarely win, and most states have placed limits on award amounts. Texas is an example. After lowering the amount a plaintiff could receive to a relatively small amount, neither insurance or medical costs were lowered and both rose as fast as states who hadn't taken the same actions. It was and has been a smokescreen to hide greed.
@sharonhines3476 Again, thanks Obamacare
This is the result of 'privatized' hospitals. They might say 'non-profit' in their description, but a 1965 law allows them to PROFIT, and they want to please their INVESTORS and could care less about the PATIENTS.
Wrong. Rich men and their insatiable greed are to blame. They own the healthcare system. And if you don't like Obamacare, why did you vote for repugs who refused to consider Medicare for all? You voted against your own best interests and now you must pay for your stupidity.
Imagine going shopping and being charged an entry fee, taking a train, bus etc and being charged to enter the station, or charged to use a chair and table in a restaurant! Crazy, it should be built into the cost of service .
Most of the money go to executives, they cut staff because they find them unnecessary
Most of US medical care is provided by corporations which have investors that expect a high return. All medical bills, especially those from hospitals, get inflated to increase corporate profits.
And you can be SURE our LawMAKERS are the first to sign up for Stock shares...
Make big signs and picket the facilities. I did it to a bank and got the unfair fees reversed. I called the bank and told then I was going to do it. Then I did it. Then I called them and told them I did it. On the third day they reversed the fees.
Thats ridiculous!!! I just had cataract surgery and had to pay the doctor and facility up front after they confirmed with my insurance what they were going to pay with my deductible . Now, im getting texts and bills in the mail that i still owe more after i paid up front!!! I seen what the insurance paid and what i already paid, they got plenty from me being in there for a few hours for a uncomplicated procedure.
Oh yeah i forgot to list cataract surgeries..a lot of my friends have had them since we reach fifty...total cost: $0..but your knobs against it :)
Check with your insurance company to see if the provider is allowed to balance bill. Most insurances do not allow their contracted providers to do this, as they already have predetermined rates.
Object, tell them to be open about the charges and then demand to be met at the car door, or if they have a pay to park plan then the public sidewalk.
It's time to get insurance out of health care. Then you will see how quickly things change, some formthe good and some for the bad. However, I think making insurance a mainstay of any system causes more problems than it solves.
I sent my doctors office a bill for the "Pleasure of having me as your patient" fee. It was exactly the same as any fee's over my co-pay. I haven't heard from them in a month. Guess I'll have to send them to collections.
👏🏼👏🏼
Check the bills of your car dealorship or Midas etc for Office fees or Misc fees. You will faint at what you are being charged for. It was told to me that it covered "office supplies, gloves, rags, staples, pens, paper, oil, window glass cleaner, and much more. F'en robbery and there isn't a thing we as customers can do about it.
Because they are paying for those items and then in some states must pay state tax on those items. As a small business in NC every year we have to list all materials on hand as of January 1st on a property tax listing that we later pay tax on. Hospitals are trying to recoup their costs by adding these fees. Tell the states and federal government to lower taxes and get rid of fees which will save us money also.
@@zuzuspetals9281 It makes no sense at all to charge a percentage of a bill over and over all day every day on Office Supplies at a 1000percent profit. The same with the auto dealerships. Being charged a fee ON TOP of the repair cost to cover windex, rags, paper etc etc......What ever happened to placing a price on something that included overhead? That would be a profit after expenses etc. What about the Key formula used to set prices? Overhead is an expense. When you have a business you use a tax excempt number for business purposes and purchases. It all seems dirty business and underhanded to me. It is just a robber's way of stealing more. What a slap in the face of the customers.
ceo got the trickle down fever, trickle down to their pay.
Here is how I recently got burned even with insurance. Called my PCP. Was told his next available appointment was in 3 weeks!!!!????? (Why do I need a PCP if I can't get a timely appointment?) I was told by phone, "We have an affiliated urgent care staffed by a doctor that can see you today. " I got zapped with a bill that was 3 times higher than my PCP plus a facilities charge. All they did was look in my ears say I had an ear infection and prescribe antibiotics. Cost me $380 plus cost of antibiotics. I was there with the doctor for 5 minutes. 😠
Well, you see, the bean-counters that run your PCP’s office need to squeeze every penny out of your PCP and his colleagues so they stuff any many patients as possible into their daily schedules, leaving no available time for urgent/emergent, i.e. unscheduled, visits. A doctor who has deliberately empty slots in his schedule is a doctor not making enough money for said bean counters. Then they create a separate urgent care system to take care of all the unscheduled visits for which they do have to allow for the possibility of the urgent care docs not seeing patients EVERY available minute of the day, so they charge you extra to make up for those “losses”.
But the US sends taxpayers money to other countries where the have free healthcare
Which countries are these ?
Your voters don't WANT free healthcare. Why don't you blame the party that rails against it rather than "government" "the us"???
Yeah but that money is for bombs and military equipment. Gotta keep the war machine going, that's our economy you're talking about.
@@sarahann530 Basically every other country on the planet. US patients have been so brainwashed by the lobbyist and hedge funds that theirs is the only way. My daughter has lived in Australia for 6 years and has way better health care and employee rights. They have living wages and no, the food chains did not have to jack their prices way up. But they do not pay their upper management stupid salaries either. [and their worst coffee shops beats the US best ones hands down].
😂😂 you're making up some myth? 🤣🤣 which fking GHETTO country wants the US's "disposable healthcare"???? 🤣🤣
How many of these hospitals received public monies to be constructed? How many tax breaks are these facilities given by the municipality?
Shameful
I’ve been paying these for a while. I get seen at a hospital and I’m there in a room not using any supplies. I sit in a chair, the dr walks in, we speak for about 10 mins, he’s gone and then I get charged about 75.00 just for the room. I’ve protested but got nowhere
Highway robbery.
This has been going on for several years. I used to work for a Health insurance company. The hospitals were charging these fees for outpatient services on hospital campuses. The last I heard, Medicare was working on a policy to not pay these fees.
Me to Double Cross!
It’s not right.
This is nationwide.
Reminds me of a story of a woman who waited hours at an ER waitroom for hours for head trauma, and left without being seen. She received a hefty bill just for waiting for nothing.
Some hospitals in Tennessee are starting to do this too.
American greed at its best😮
The sons and daughters of Rick Scott ride again.
Making more health care in the US unaccessable!
This makes me so thankful for the UK’s NHS, I’ve recently had a blood test (routine for the meds I take), phone call from GP for an anomaly, second blood test + test kit. Then a consultation at our main hospital. The only fees are for the prescription charge (flat rate with some exemptions). Similar scenarios in the EU. The patients and families who need care have a few less worries.
That's been happening for many years. I'm 77 yrs old & took care of my parents for their last 25 years. I called the hospitals time and again, even went there once to show them they were overcharging my mother. They took it off.
How about them hospital executives making millions per year? How are they supposed to get paid without these fees?
please be confident and tell those greedy people that you will not pay anything you did not use.
Local hospital has this. Visited a sleep clinic for a consultation. Billed for NP who worked for the clinic, another for a NP who worked for the hospital (only one NP was necessary) and then by the hospital for the clinic’s office space. Always ask for full disclosure of billing before accepting service.
As a healthcare worker, I can tell you, none of that "Staff charge" money actually goes to us, the facility keeps that for itself.
No, if the patient read the check in form they signed, it completely states that facility charges are separate charges. Patients wanted a complete disclosure of charges for medical bills which is why medical bills were broken into two fees…doctor and facility. It takes money to run a building: power, water, housekeepers, mechanical, plumbers, technology, electricity, cleaning supplies, medical tools, medical machines, receptionist … nothing is free! These are people who just sign documents without reading what they sign then complain when they get the bill. I have had multiple medical issues and it states on the checkin form I sign for every visit.
This happened to me 30 years ago. I just refused to pay. When I started getting phone calls from a collection agency, I still refused to pay. They finally stopped calling me.
After visit fees should be banned. Where else do you go for a service or purchase and, as an after thought, you get another bill in the mail? And one you have no idea about and how much it will be. I've had it happen so often, and we are not taking a few $$ but hundreds !!
None of the people treating patients know or even have access to that information at the time they are seeing patients in most hospitals. Then the insurance companies have negotiated fees with hospitals, which are all different from each other and many times different between different plans at the same insurance company. In short, there is no way for you or your physician to know what the fee will be until it bounces around between billing and insurance.
_"Don't you never come in here empty handed again, you gotta pay for the pleasure of my company."_
- Bill Cutting, MD.
Hey, it happens in Round Rock too. We simply switched physicians, and warned the new ones what kinds of things annoyed us enough to leave our previous providers.
It's overhead. For-profit hospitals need to set their charges to cover this... not via a "pass-thru" fee structure.
Notice that they won't cut "need another mansion" expenses!
There is one other issue to bring up, Let's say you have a good HMO and you go in for an xray or CT scan and when finished your HMO pays there discounted rate to the facility you went to, for example your xray total cost before your HMO discount is say $150 and your HMO only pays the contracted amount of $100, well then your xray facility sends you a bill for $50.00. I never pay it because my insurance tells me I do not have to pay. One more pit fall of being retired
Totally uncalled for. Just more ridiculous add on fees to drive up the cost of a doctor visit. ✊💲
So now they cannot claim that they do no harm to patients and in the case-children. Disgusting 🤮
I'm a victim of those fees. Insane! I will not be paying that bill.
We are in a different state and the local-ish university hospital system is picking up on its facility fees. Whats the worst about it is that you ca t get anyone to tell you what they will be ahead of time. We have switched providers in some cases like what should have been free podiatry care was beeing charged a $200 per visit outpaitent sugery facility fee because sugical services are performed in the 6 story medical building. We have kept a few providers by opting for what are called remote clinic buildings some multiple miles away from buildings that offer services considered surgery; i think there are facility fees but they are covered by insurrance.
You are sent for yearly routine testing, then it’s up to you to get the results weeks later after going through taped messages only to discover they can’t help and you have to start over. You never see the same doctor so they don’t know your medical history. Turnover is so high that you don’t get to know anyone in reception.
You leave messages and after a couple days with no call back you go through it again.
You have to wait for an hour+ every time you go and then they want to tack on facility fee…I don’t think so. I was charged more than in the past at neurologist and when I questioned the front desk they said I had run over the 15 minutes (by 5 minutes) with the doctor, that billing is done by 15 min increments.
I didn’t push on staff but I sent a letter directly to the doctor that I had been going to for 15 years and in the future I would be deducting from my bill for every 15 minutes I have to sit in waiting room. No call back but charge was reimbursed.
Here in Canada we have access to everything on our own files online..free of course..not charged per access, monthly or download like they'll do to you eventually. I got to see my brainscan, my mri's, my bloodwork results..all of it going back years so i can track my health. Its amazing!
Moved from Missouri to Laredo for my husbands family and needed a quick visit to get my son into daycare. Went to what we were told was the low income place to go and they charged us THREE HUNDRED dollars for a check up on 2 year old!!! I was floored!!!! I could pay like 90 out of pocket for my dr in Missouri! Wonder if this is what they did to charge such a crazy price!
How ironic that in America the cost of 'medical care' keeps going up, but the quality keeps going down down down.
They are also charging the doctors. Makes you wonder.
Please explain.
Are they?
I have been to hospital in Australia a number of times and I have NEVER been charged for anything like that, all hospital areas fall under the public health. They are not allowed to make a profit at the expense of the patent, that’s totally nuts.
Insanity if they think people will continue to pay for these additional mystery fees.
The term "patient" doesn't exist anymore! Everyone is a customer! Money first, health second!
Damn shame!!!
Had a doctor send in a bill for a visit he supposedly did when my mother was in a nursing home. The date he said he saw her was 3 days after I buried her. She had died, and he was trying to bill Medicare for a visit that never occurred and makes me wonder how many bills Medicare paid to this crook.
Report him to Medicare. They can check into what he is billing
This has been going on for a long time. I go to a hospital in the North, and I have always gone to the same doctors, but with the onset of the pandemic and afterwards, I have noticed a facility fee. I tried talking to someone about it, but they turn a deaf ear.
And the bad part about it, the insurance companies don't challenge them, they just pay it. So, if they are getting paid, why not continue. Then they wonder why your ins, premiums are so high.
I've been charged that here in CA
Start charging 'Patient Access Fees' at double their rate. Tack on 'On Time Fee' and 'Delay of Treatment Penalty' also wear and tear on shoe leather and pants seat fabrics.
Where's Abbott? This is what Paxton should be taking to court.
We're these fees disclosed to patients ever?...
Esp. The 1st time they came in...and before treatment?
I have had this done to me. It should be banned. I refuse to go back to that clinic now
DISGUSTING PRICE GOUGING BY HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS!