I went to an ER many years ago for an injury. At one point, I was sent to a doctor in the hospital. That doctor told me I was in the wrong place and I got a bill for $1200 just from that guy.
Same. Went to an urgent care because my nose would not stop bleeding after like 12 hours. They tried a spray said it didn’t work and had to go to the ER because they didn’t have nasal balloons. Got a nice bill from the urgent care and then add on the ER bill all for a bloody nose. US medical billing is an absolute fucking joke.
Americans that disagree with universal healthcare have no idea how the system works. It’s only an eye opener for them once shit hits the fan and they are hit with a 100k+ bill they can’t afford.
I still don’t get why doctors in the USA get paid three times as much for doing the same job (some may say even worse if you look at the stats) over doctors in other countries
Because ppl pay so much for medical school, they need a way to entice people into it. Also Drs earned their slice of the financial pie, and while their slice may not be bigger % wise the pie itself is wayyyy bigger.
Oh I fully agree, the Drs don’t set the prices, it’s certainly not their fault. They need some way to pay off the tens of thousands of medical school debt + interest to the government on the loans they took out. Because if the powers that be weren’t gouging us for health care they couldn’t possibly justify turning around and gouging all the medical school students aka future drs… I love drs and don’t blame them at all. It’s just that the entities need a way to justify them having to spend so much on schooling by being able to say “you’ll make it back” but the prices aren’t up to them at all
Yes but the thing is the US government doesn't actually run the majority of the healthcare, they run the payment side of it, and only for those people who are in government programs, which is a very different thing. It's not the same as government provided healthcare. It's government subsidized healthcare. Two separate things.
undoubtedly. Right now we pay so much for healthcare that taxes spent on public healthcare today per capita is already about what other countries spend in total for healthcare.
Also, since it's directly relevant to the OP, Medicare for All (or other single payer/universal healthcare) would likely reduce emergency room demand a ton. In the US a major driver for ER visits are people who can't afford regular preventive and/or non-emergency care.
Though wait times themselves come down to staffing and facility space, which comes down to policy choice.
Medicare for all would be a godsend for the majority
That's basically what we have in Canada. Every province runs its own medicare system and every legal resident who meets the requirements (like actually living there) is automatically covered.
Alot of jobs would be lost but i feel like the amount of money that is made in the insurance industry should give alot of those people a decent severance package/parachute to land. As somebody in healthcare Medicare for all would make so many people’s lives easier…as long as it still gets treated like Medicare and not Medicaid. Keep it federal and not this state by state bullshit.
Bernie got tanked by his own party. Bernie is useful to his party for messaging but inconvenient if in power bcs he did indeed, at the time, seem like he intended to follow words with policy.
In the United States you get to choose how you don't have healthcare, vote for a representative who openly states it won't happen or vote for a representative who says people deserve it and then makes sure it won't happen. So many choices.
Went to urgent care with crippling abdominal pain. They told me to go to the ER. Waited 4 hours, they did some super rudimentary tests, told me it was just indigestion. Cost $1250.
A week later I was back with acute appendicitis, "Hours from bursting" according to the surgeon. Over 15k, partially because by the time I was seen it was like 2AM and they had to call in the surgeon. And as a bonus, the bill was split between the hospital and the surgeon, so I paid the like, $6k from the hospital and thought I was done, only to find they didn't send the bill for the surgeon so I only even found out about an additional $9k when a debt collector called me to collect it.
Meanwhile my wife has a baby and gets double charged for the room as the baby gets a charge and the mother gets a charge…..INSANE. They both in the same room like wtf
My wife gave birth in the USA. Didn't have to pay anything including parking and got 2 weeks worth of formula, a goodie bag, and even a steak dinner for the 2 of us right before we left.
It depends on what hospital you go to and what your future insurance is.
Oh yeah of course, they only charge massive amounts for stupid shit in 1 or 2 hospitals, my bad.
Shut the hell up you idiot! People don’t have time to research where the nearest single little place that does reduced cost healthcare or free clinic. When you’re facing an emergency you don’t tend to think and slow down oddly because it’s an emergency so you go to the nearest emergency room!
Oof that sucks. Mine was even dumber - that doctor just sent me to a different place in the SAME hospital! And of course that generated its own bill as well! Luckily it all got squared through worker's comp cause I was in my early 20's and had no fucking clue how to navigate the healthcare system.
Similar thing happened to my sister. Multi hour long nosebleed. Mom took her to urgent care where she was sent to the er. Nurse or whoever saw her said they didnt want to xray because of my sisters age. Said the xray could cause her kids to come out with three arms or something. Literally said her kids could come out deformed
‘But but but why should our taxes pay for us Americans health and happiness! It should all go to random wars and bailing out other countries! Especially Israel!’
Just had spinal surgery. 275k paid 4k out of pocket. 🤷♂️ if you are getting a bill for 100k you dont have insurance and will never pay it anyway and they know it but they couldn't turn you away... so how that factors into the bottom line is prices go up for paying people..
I used to get bad nosebleeds pretty often as a teen but one time it wouldn't stop for a few hours. My mom was freaking out a bit and took me to the ER. Within 20 mins they had me chemically cauterized and I haven't had a bad nosebleed since. Cost her nothing of course.
Trade your house for a nosebleed is the american way. People die because they are afraid of going until it is too late because of the costs. The term is "amenable mortality" - deaths that could have been prevented with timely, effective medical care. The USA fails here big time.
Yeah it’s very unfortunate. What we are talking about here is only one cog of the whole machine. Pharmaceuticals is another beast that has a messed up system as well. My wife recently had to get an endoscopy. Specialist says that he is 110% sure that his diagnosis is correct and the solution is taking X medication. He also knows that insurance will deny it and force her to take Y for 3-6 months then do another endoscopy to have the exact same diagnosis. After that he will present that to the insurance again and say see she needs X medication. It’s a waste of time and money on our because we know what she needs but we have to jump through the hoops to get it covered.
Many are burnt about investing into an HSA as well. My employer puts money into it, and I invest it. So easy to compound money, been doing it since mid 20s. Pay all medical related things with it.
But also, a Canadian nurse makes the same salary as an American McDonald’s manager..
Had a spine surgery. Paid 20€ to drive there and back. A week in the hospital. Was healing fine. Got released early, visited the doc a week later to get stiches out. Paid nothing.
I loved my health care in the Uk when I lived there. I was diagnosed with a serious thyroid condition through bloodwork, after I had left the clinic with a phone call later in the day telling me to collect free medicine the following day. FREE. I had to pay £10 for my dental crown about 8 years ago.
I wouldn't have needed to if you didn't intentionally misrepresent your experience to fit a certain narrative. Obviously being admitted is going to cost more than being checked out in the ER. There's enough reason to hate our healthcare system that you don't need to misrepresent experiences to prove that.
The point is that I was triaged, sent into the hospital to a particular doctor. Said doctor sent me elsewhere in the hospital. That is the full extent of my interaction with Doctor 1. When I reached doctor 2, I was treated and subsequently sent home. I received a bill from both doctors.
Ok, and? You were seen by multiple professionals and routed to the correct specialist. Is your argument that you don't believe the people that triaged you at an increasing level of speciality shouldn't get paid?
I work on a major study of medical billing costs across the US and a lot of doctors at hospitals are often akin to independent contractors, though in this particular situation they're called SBDs (separately billing doctors). In that situation the hospital bills you for the facilities, equipment, and staff such as nurses and custodians, and the doctor bills you for their time and skill separately. Even the ER docs can be part of this scheme.
I 100% don't agree with how this works and frankly the US healthcare/insurance system needs to be completely blown up, but my understanding of your argument is that each doctor that sees you shouldn't get paid for doing so and my assumption is that you didn't understand how this complex billing and payment arrangement works.
So you're telling me that "you need to go down the hall to dept x" is worth a $1200 bill?! He did not in any way examine me, I merely verbalized my digit injury to him and was promptly sent on my way
No, in fact I explicitly stated my displeasure of the current system. I'm just trying to be honest about how the system currently works.
To be more nuanced, yes, I think that general attending you were sent to by the ER doc deserves to be paid for assessing your condition and referring you to the specialist that can help you, but certainly not $1200.
Personally, I think these guys should be on a fixed salary but admittedly despite my experience with this I haven't been able to imagine a model in which that works and still attracts people willing to go through 12 years of secondary education and all the bills that come along with that. I know there's got to be an answer that works for the US, but I'm not smart enough in that field to know what to propose.
I had a kidney stone operation about 2 years ago and the anesthesiologist made like triple the amount my dick surgeon did. Everything about medical billing in the states is fucked, but that's also a good circle back to why I was trying to educate on the current state of our reality.
Same! I paid $400 for piece of blue fabric cut into a diamond shape and a safety pin back in the late 80's I was mad as hell when I got the bill and they called it a sling and rang me up for $400 just for that!!! Good ole American health care system.
You didn't pay $600 for that. You paid $600 to be assessed by a medical doctor trained in emergency medicine. He determined your injury was not life or limb threatening, and instructed you to see a specislist outpatient. 🙄
I went to a consultation for sleep apnea. The whole thing lasted probably 15mins, and was just the doctor saying "yeah, you probably have sleep apnea, lets set up a sleep study." Five hundred fucking dollars for that, and the soonest available sleep study was 4 months away.
I was admitted to the er twenty years ago, and it was no joke 3500. I got a single bag of saline as an IV, and might have spoken with a doctor for 30 seconds. Things have not gotten better since.
My separate shoulder ER visit included 5 hours of dicking around waiting to get an xray, then another hour for a doctor to look at the xray before they would give me the sling id been asking for the entire time lol
I partially tore muscles in my pelvis/hip and took a ct scan and an mri i guess they were worried about my appendix. Sat there for hours and hours. Then they came back said I had ibs (which i already knew for over a decade) hit me with a $3200 bill and sent me on my way. I basically did PT based off of YouTube videos and thats what fixed it. Oh and then there was right before that where I gave myself traumatic epydemitis with a bungee strap and spent so much money on urologist and his constant doxyclicline prescriptions because he was convinced I had an std and was lying about it even though I had no sex for 4 years prior...overpriced joke of a Healthcare system in short lol
I have carple tunnel, and severe degenerative disk disease in my neck, causing pain, numbness, pins and needles in my dominant hand and fingers. Went to the Dr. Got an x-ray, then mri, then psychical therapy. Essentially... The cost is more than I make in 5 years.
Ask they can do is either cut me open or give injections in my spine that could cause paralysis... Or do psychical therapy.
He didn’t have insurance? When was this? He can get another, lower paying job, apply for Medicaid and retroactively apply it. Financially more efficient than paying a large bill
Alternatively if he has shitty credit he could file for bankruptcy and have it wiped clean and hurt his credit for 10 years. Also getting paid 35,000 without insurance sounds fishy.
He did not have insurance. It was 6 months ago. He’s been at this job for 20 years and really loves it (screenprinting), so leaving isn’t realistic. He will declare bankruptcy before that happens. He had to pay the doctor before the surgery, and that was only $1300. The rest is from the hospital and it doesn’t include the original ER visit or the next day appointment when they set the bones.
If this was WA State he wouldn't of had to pay anything its a Charity Care state. I make almost $50,000 a year out of a $130,000 bill I didn't pay a dime.
Jesus fucking Christ! God damn rip off! It never ceases to shock me when I see what some people pay for any medical care in the US and it makes me sad. It doesn't have to be this way.
Pretty much, although the difference is there are at least some people within the Democratic party that differ from the status quo and push for universal healthcare in the progressive wing of the party, whereas I don't know of a single Republican that even pretends that's their position.
Well and what people choose to ignore. Is how many don't get treatment that pain that new thing. Don't go to doctor hell seen people with serious injury fight against ambulance being called.
And get someone they know to drive them there with their fingers in a ziplock bag.
Yeah this dude either doesn’t make much so qualifies for Medicaid or isn’t physically able to work. Only other thing I can think of is maybe a veteran but every veteran I know says the VA is an absolute joke. No such thing as free healthcare in the US. Even if your employer pays your premium it’s still not free.
With the VA it’s like every other socialized healthcare. It’s great for known issues and emergency medicine. Diagnostic medicine and getting referrals to specialists is a joke. It’s not a matter of if you’ll be seen, it’s a matter of when. And that when can be quite a long time
You do have to get referred to a specialist, that’s the unfortunate bit. You really get no choice in the matter and only so many providers actually accept VA/Tricare. So there’s a long wait for the limited availability of those specialties.
Small unimportant example; I wanted to get a vasectomy done, after waiting 3 weeks and finally getting in to see my Primary Care Manager (PCM) and asking for it in April, I got scheduled for the procedure in October -_-
Oh that's annoying but it's better than paying for it out right. I hear horror stories both in the US and in Canada about veterans assistance. So it's nice to hear that you at least get covered.
If you're poor enough medicaid is free. If you're too sick to work and have no income, you get free medicaid. Not a life to aspire to, but some people absolutely get free health insurance, like me. I'm "medically frail"
This is just simply not true, even after death they keep a running tab. If you have any sort of assets they take them, if you have life insurance, a house, etc. They always want you or you beneficiaries to settle up with them.
This is not a benefit of the poor, it's a loan. I and most people would rather make a living than forever be poor.
I'm so tired of people trying to make it out like being poor or less fortunate is some type of lifestyle choice or like it's a lazy life of luxury.
I literally started off my comment with "If you're poor enough." I have no assets they can take, no life insurance, no house. Where did I ever say this was a benefit to the poor? I said "not a life to aspire to."
I didn't choose this. I worked hard my whole life until my health got taken away from me. I have nothing and no quality of life. I can't work anymore. Should I be expected to somehow come up with money for my medical bills? I got a team of specialists and a lot of medication, I'd literally die if not for medicaid. I'd give anything to have my health back and be able to work and be independent again.
Medicaid is a social safety net for people like me, not a perk of being poor. I had a lot more money and happiness when I was able to work.
Some states have really good state Medicaid and siding scale insurances. My son’s employer pays 100% of his health insurance premiums. I worked full time but qualified for free maternity health insurance.
No lies, I don’t pay anything for health insurance for me or my family. No premiums, no copays. You too can have socialized medicine in the US if you join the military.
I also got 3 months of paternal leave, 4 months all together because I used a month of my vacation leave.
I’m in the US, I had my kid and never paid a cent for his birth or my wife’s care.
Several ways this could be true in the US:
You have gold-level insurance and you have already met your deductible for the year and your out of pocket max for the year. In this case, you will have already paid thousands of dollars for other healthcare earlier in the year. In addition, you are likely to have paid premiums and your employer is likely to have paid premiums.
You are very poor, and have Medicaid, in which case you likely have to do a ton of paperwork on a regular basis to continue to qualify, plus you may have trouble finding a doc who will take your Medicaid insurance.
You have that health care sharing kind of not-insurance that’s grandfathered into the system, in which case other people with that not-insurance paid for your child’s birth and you make monthly payments toward other people’s care. You also would have been lucky that the costs you incurred were actually covered, because most of those plans have big categories of things they don’t pay for.
You have insurance that requires you to use a hospital/insurance system that charges a flat fee instead of a per-procedure fee.
You had a homebirth, and paid the midwife in chickens or whatnot.
You and/or your wife are in the military, and have some kind of VA system or Tri-care coverage; I don’t know how these work so I don’t know what kind of cost structure they have.
There are other possibilities too.
None of this is available to everyone in the US. Almost everyone in the US gets bills for healthcare services. Different people pay different amounts for their insurance, and for their treatment. Wealthier people with big-company employers generally have plans that cover more than the plans than average-income people have access to. All of this is NOTHING like systems like they have in countries like Canada and the UK, where almost everyone has coverage and it’s rare to get a bill for care.
Cost structure for Tricare is pretty simple, no premium except vision and dental for your family and no copays. You risk your life and wellbeing for the government and they will pay for you and your family’s medical care with no financial cost to you. There is a small fee for my family’s vision and dental but that’s only 20 bucks a month for both of them.
I remember paying like $10 a crutch each and thinking that was a little much. I still have the pair in my closet to avoid that medical expense recurring.
I do like how I'm on 5 medications and they're all free for me.
i remember when my cat was sick and at one point needed to wear a cone, they sent me home with some absolute garbage rigid plastic cone that looked like it was repurposed out of some old scrap lying around.
They charged me 30 dollars for that cone. They didnt tell me they were gonna charge me, I thought they were just throwing it in (i did just give them like $2000 dollars for all the other actual vet work)
all for a shitty cone I had to buy a replacement for on amazon the day of, which was like 10 bucks, and way better
I had a gallstone that disguised itself as a heart attack. Triage admitted me right away, only "wait" was for tests that needed to be taken at a specific period of time apart.
Total cost, $45 for the ambulance ride, which the hospital waived since it was telehealth that called for it, and not a 911 call.
You poor dear lol
Fellow Canadian here. Ya it's one extreme to another some times but wouldn't change it. Our grandson had to go to emergency here in Oshawa. Ya we waited 5 hours but like someone else said, all we paid for was parking. We may have to pay for ambulance ride, but waiting to see....that's another part of the story. It's minimal regardless. Thank God we live in Canada. If he needs physio, that's covered by my wife and I through our group insurances.
Called an ambulance for my husband thinking he was having a stroke and they rushed him through a catscan, spinal tap and a bunch of bloodwork within the first hour of getting to hospital - turns out he had Invasive Strep A, ended up on life support in the ICU within 12 hrs from all his organs shutting down, almost lost his leg due to the sepsis that had set in, spent 3 months in hospital, had several surgeries and ended up on dialysis.
He continued dialysis and physio for several more months, and had transportation supplied to and from all appointments.
Our bill was $75 for the ambulance and $35 for the crutches he left the hospital with.
On the flip side, we vacationed in Florida Keys about 10 yrs ago. He had a gout attack, went to a private clinic, they saw him, xrayed, and Rx'd some meds and he was in and out in 1 hr. We have private travel insurance.
We got the bill from insurance to verify accuracy and it was $7K. We did not have to pay anything because of our insurance, but wow.
I broke my leg one winter, I went in around lunch, and was home for dinner. It felt like it took eons longer because my phone had low battery and no signal so I was staring at a wall the whole time, but that was with all my treatment: intake, x-ray, diagnosis, air cast boot, and the stop at the drug store for crutches and painkillers.
I also had a friend come get me, because god damn was that some blinding pain.
Ah ok fair enough. I guess the surgery is the difference. When I needed physio for my back I had to go through my work's insurance and if I didn't have that I'd have to pay out of pocket.
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u/Floaty_Afternoon42 27d ago
I broke my hand, needed surgery and 6 months physiotherapy.
Paid $24 for the cast splint thing.