Originally Posted by
dogrange
I was staying out of this, but David, I just have to reinforce the point that the current system is unacceptably opaque and inefficient, to the benefit of I'm not sure whom, but certainly not the patient. What, 2 daughters went to the same emergency room 3 months apart with the same treatment and the bill is 3X for daughter #2. Call insurance company - no idea, that's what the hospital billed. BTW insurance company, you actually charged me for more than the hospital billed you Call hospital - no idea, we must have thought we did more on daughter 2. No recourse to challenge these bills. WTF other industry can get away with not publishing prices and then charging whatever they feel like after the fact with essentially no recourse for the purchaser? This is the almighty private market at work?
Just try to find out what you are going to pay for anything upfront, just try. Call Aetna for estimate for CAT scan to see if foot fracture is healing. Tell them extent of CAT scan and facility - "we can only estimate what it might cost." Try to get prescription cold sore cream (which, btw, is over the counter in Canada, Mexico, EU) that costs $4 last year. Walgreens told me straight that it would now cost $850! Called Target - their low price is $2500! WTF?!?!!? Call insurance company, person on the phone reads from script of nonresponsive nonsense. I work in healthcare, so I presume the real reason is that this medicine is no longer "on formulary," but the person on the phone doesn't even know enough to confirm that simple question. How much more Kafka-esque can this before we all agree that we are living in a healthcare billing twilight zone?
Not to mention the 4 different bills for the same visit/procedure (Dr. hospital, lab and G-d knows who else feel free to send you inscrutable bills separately). The duplicate overhead of hundreds of "insurance companies" (this ain't "insurance" in my book) is better than the supposed inefficiency of the feared government?
I don't even have any significant health problems (at least not yet), and this is my experience just from the last few months. I could go on for days about a close relative with severe Ulcerative Colitis and her problems with hospitals, pharmacies, screwed up bills, script-reading private-provider automatons, but that would make this rant actually depressing, so I'll spare everyone. In short, her care has been OK (not great), but the financial/billing/payment aspects have been, to repeat the analogy, a real-life Twilight Zone morass that is a significant distraction, and dare I say, is detrimental to the care and outcomes of someone dealing with a serious condition.
Sorry guys, rant over. I'll put my flame suit on now.
Bookmarks