16 ms·

>They took it; now I use this technique all the time. I’ve done this once for a $12,000 bill for a few stitches. They refused any deals, until I showed I actu

>They took it; now I use this technique all the time. I’ve done this once for a $12,000 bill for a few stitches. They refused any deals, until I showed I actually took video of hospital staff promising it wouldn’t be more than $2,000 before treatment, in response they waived the entire bill. The way you phrase this though...how often are you receiving acute medical treatment?

jopsen 7y ago
> The way you phrase this though...how often are you receiving acute medical treatment? I was unable to a price quote of any kind before elective procedures, when I lived in the US (last year). My insurance was good, but they would not say if they would cover the bill ahead of time.
caprese 7y ago
I should do that Everytime some staff member says "it will be covered we are just doing x, y, z this is covered" and then you get a bill from the insurance company and the doctor's office says "we THOUGHT it was covered"
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  Video recording like that is totally throwing the staff under the bus (they will undoubtedly be talked to about making commitments like that). I'm sure hospitals will all include a "all promises maid by staff are null and void unless documented in writing" waiver if the practice becomes widespread.
  - will_brown 7y ago
    >I'm sure hospitals will all include a "all promises maid by staff are null and void unless documented in writing" Despite all the FUD about health care prices, most states have consumer protection laws that require providers/hospitals to provide estimates for services upon request. Therefore, by law (state by state) the hospitals could not employ the tactic you suggest.
    - btrettel 7y ago
      Which states specifically have these laws? What's the typical legal name for these laws? Couldn't find anything on this in a few quick Google searches.
      - will_brown 7y ago
        In Florida you can checkout Florida Statute 395.301 (Price transparency;itemized patient statement or bill;patient admission status notification). I know this off hand, and don’t have the time but from there you could probably find a few websites that will reference comparable laws for each state, if they exist.
        btrettel 7y ago
        Thanks. Working from there, this website list many state health care price laws in a PDF: https://www.pcpcc.org/resource/report-card-state-price-transparency-laws https://www.pcpcc.org/resource/report-card-state-price-trans... This is just what I could find quickly. There might be better resources on these laws.
        will_brown 7y ago
        Looks like a really good resource/starting place. Law is an unforgiving beast so you would always want to refer to the source law they cite, and finding case law (much more difficult task) which references said Law and see how it’s applied/interpreted in practice. What you linked is certainly much more practical for educational/informational purposes.
  - nullandvoid 7y ago
    And the patient getting thrown under the bus by getting screwed with a 5x bill is fine? Recording sure sounds like the lesser evil to me
    - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
      >And the patient getting thrown under the bus by getting screwed with a 5x bill is fine? Where did I say or imply that? I think it's fully worth it and wouldn't lose sleep over throwing the staff under the bus. If you want to work for an establishment that screws people getting screwed back occasionally is just one of the risks.
webdevmark 7y ago
As a British person living in the UK reading stories like this seems so crazy. The very idea that when Americans are ill they need to negotiate with these huge institutions seems so utterly bizarre and messed up. Surely if people know they could be fined thousands for simple treatments like stitches they avoid medical care altogether? Then things could get worse and even more expensive...
- umvi 7y ago
  I mean, you are also seeing the extreme cases float to the top because articles like these attract anecdotes. It's hard to tell how widespread the problem is because people who pay a more reasonable amount for stitches don't comment in these kinds of threads. For all we know this only happens .1% of the time FWIW, I've never had such extreme bills. The largest bill I've received in the last few years was $2000 for my wife's epidural, but I only paid about $400 of it (insurance paid the other $1600)
  - shazow 7y ago
    Nearly 100% of people spend some time in a hospital in their lives. Unless you're claiming that hospitals only gouge some tiny subset of people and are benevolently generous to everyone else, that number is going to be much closer to 100% than 0.1%. When I lived in the US, I have personally experienced this, even with top-tier insurance--from both ends: I've had insurance decline claims arbitrarily and pass on five-figure costs to me, and I've had hospitals misclaim things. In both cases, I had to spend dozens of hours on the phone to resolve it. Most people in the US are far less privileged: Their insurance is not as good, and they don't have the luxury of spending dozens of hours on the phone. It's just a matter of time until you experience this.
    - 378fho 7y ago
      > Unless you're claiming that hospitals only gouge some tiny subset of people and are benevolently generous to everyone else, that number is going to be much closer to 100% than 0.1%. Actually, yes. Doctors and hospitals have relationships. When a hospital is aware that a good referral source referred them a patient, they will try to keep the patient happy to maintain that source of business. They're very selective about who they try to screw. Now if you walk in with no referral and no family doctor, then you're their source of profits and the party they'll try to milk.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
hombre_fatal 7y ago
I live in Mexico and have had to get stitches many times. Paid $4 per stitch in the private hospitals in Guadalajara. I paid $24 in cash with the pesos in my pocket and walked home. Even the dentist system in Mexico is walk in, pay, walk out for high quality work. I tried to go to the dentist when visiting family in Texas and had to fill out paperwork and pay to be a member first. Seems like the only benefit of the US system is when you have a nice job, everything is basically free. Probably why nothing will change too much anytime soon. To quit your nice job to try to start a business forces you to gamble with your healthcare.
- JudgeWapner 7y ago
  isn't it true, however, that in MX if you don't already have the money to pay you will be turned away? If you walk into an ER in Guadalajara with a broken wrist and no money/insurance, what do they do?
  - hombre_fatal 7y ago
    lolwut? Even in my story above where I casually walked into the hospital, they had no idea about my ability to pay until after treatment had been rendered. And just like in the US, you can walk out the front door at that point. But unlike the US, nobody is deluded into thinking you're bailing on a $12,000 bill because you got some stitches. I got stitches in Austin five years ago after drunkenly slipping on a party barge and gashing my head open. The whole time I was getting stitches, someone was there using scare tactics to ensure I was going to pay for them, tried to take my name and info down, suggested that maybe we should only do 3 stitches instead of 4 if I wasn't going to give them my info. Probably extra pushy because I was drunk. They billed me thousands, I gave them the $100 in my wallet and walked out the door. My experience in Mexico for basically everything related to healthcare has been superior to the USA, from drugs to child birth to surgery to other healthcare fields like dentistry. I'd probably rather get cancer here, too. I know a Mexican here with a brain tumor that gets operated on every year. He can walk in to a public hospital, but he prefers the private ones. His last operation, he paid $1,500 cash. I don't even want to know what that would cost in the USA. Probably the rest of your life in servitude. The USA is nice when you have a cushy white collar job like most HNers, and that's what I don't like. I don't want to work a cushy job all my life. I want to live off my savings for years at a time, live on a beach, take risks, start things, yet not lose half my savings when I have an accident. As far as I'm concerned, the USA can't deliver that.
jaunkst 7y ago
Yikes. Think I'm going to learn to do my own stiches.

jopsen 7y ago

> The way you phrase this though...how often are you receiving acute medical treatment? I was unable to a price quote of any kind before elective procedures, when I lived in the US (last year). My insurance was good, but they would not say if they would cover the bill ahead of time.

caprese 7y ago

I should do that Everytime some staff member says "it will be covered we are just doing x, y, z this is covered" and then you get a bill from the insurance company and the doctor's office says "we THOUGHT it was covered"

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
Video recording like that is totally throwing the staff under the bus (they will undoubtedly be talked to about making commitments like that). I'm sure hospitals will all include a "all promises maid by staff are null and void unless documented in writing" waiver if the practice becomes widespread.
- will_brown 7y ago
  >I'm sure hospitals will all include a "all promises maid by staff are null and void unless documented in writing" Despite all the FUD about health care prices, most states have consumer protection laws that require providers/hospitals to provide estimates for services upon request. Therefore, by law (state by state) the hospitals could not employ the tactic you suggest.
  - btrettel 7y ago
    Which states specifically have these laws? What's the typical legal name for these laws? Couldn't find anything on this in a few quick Google searches.
    - will_brown 7y ago
      In Florida you can checkout Florida Statute 395.301 (Price transparency;itemized patient statement or bill;patient admission status notification). I know this off hand, and don’t have the time but from there you could probably find a few websites that will reference comparable laws for each state, if they exist.
      - btrettel 7y ago
        Thanks. Working from there, this website list many state health care price laws in a PDF: https://www.pcpcc.org/resource/report-card-state-price-transparency-laws https://www.pcpcc.org/resource/report-card-state-price-trans... This is just what I could find quickly. There might be better resources on these laws.
        will_brown 7y ago
        Looks like a really good resource/starting place. Law is an unforgiving beast so you would always want to refer to the source law they cite, and finding case law (much more difficult task) which references said Law and see how it’s applied/interpreted in practice. What you linked is certainly much more practical for educational/informational purposes.
- nullandvoid 7y ago
  And the patient getting thrown under the bus by getting screwed with a 5x bill is fine? Recording sure sounds like the lesser evil to me
  - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
    >And the patient getting thrown under the bus by getting screwed with a 5x bill is fine? Where did I say or imply that? I think it's fully worth it and wouldn't lose sleep over throwing the staff under the bus. If you want to work for an establishment that screws people getting screwed back occasionally is just one of the risks.

webdevmark 7y ago

As a British person living in the UK reading stories like this seems so crazy. The very idea that when Americans are ill they need to negotiate with these huge institutions seems so utterly bizarre and messed up. Surely if people know they could be fined thousands for simple treatments like stitches they avoid medical care altogether? Then things could get worse and even more expensive...

umvi 7y ago
I mean, you are also seeing the extreme cases float to the top because articles like these attract anecdotes. It's hard to tell how widespread the problem is because people who pay a more reasonable amount for stitches don't comment in these kinds of threads. For all we know this only happens .1% of the time FWIW, I've never had such extreme bills. The largest bill I've received in the last few years was $2000 for my wife's epidural, but I only paid about $400 of it (insurance paid the other $1600)
- shazow 7y ago
  Nearly 100% of people spend some time in a hospital in their lives. Unless you're claiming that hospitals only gouge some tiny subset of people and are benevolently generous to everyone else, that number is going to be much closer to 100% than 0.1%. When I lived in the US, I have personally experienced this, even with top-tier insurance--from both ends: I've had insurance decline claims arbitrarily and pass on five-figure costs to me, and I've had hospitals misclaim things. In both cases, I had to spend dozens of hours on the phone to resolve it. Most people in the US are far less privileged: Their insurance is not as good, and they don't have the luxury of spending dozens of hours on the phone. It's just a matter of time until you experience this.
  - 378fho 7y ago
    > Unless you're claiming that hospitals only gouge some tiny subset of people and are benevolently generous to everyone else, that number is going to be much closer to 100% than 0.1%. Actually, yes. Doctors and hospitals have relationships. When a hospital is aware that a good referral source referred them a patient, they will try to keep the patient happy to maintain that source of business. They're very selective about who they try to screw. Now if you walk in with no referral and no family doctor, then you're their source of profits and the party they'll try to milk.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

hombre_fatal 7y ago

I live in Mexico and have had to get stitches many times. Paid $4 per stitch in the private hospitals in Guadalajara. I paid $24 in cash with the pesos in my pocket and walked home. Even the dentist system in Mexico is walk in, pay, walk out for high quality work. I tried to go to the dentist when visiting family in Texas and had to fill out paperwork and pay to be a member first. Seems like the only benefit of the US system is when you have a nice job, everything is basically free. Probably why nothing will change too much anytime soon. To quit your nice job to try to start a business forces you to gamble with your healthcare.

JudgeWapner 7y ago
isn't it true, however, that in MX if you don't already have the money to pay you will be turned away? If you walk into an ER in Guadalajara with a broken wrist and no money/insurance, what do they do?
- hombre_fatal 7y ago
  lolwut? Even in my story above where I casually walked into the hospital, they had no idea about my ability to pay until after treatment had been rendered. And just like in the US, you can walk out the front door at that point. But unlike the US, nobody is deluded into thinking you're bailing on a $12,000 bill because you got some stitches. I got stitches in Austin five years ago after drunkenly slipping on a party barge and gashing my head open. The whole time I was getting stitches, someone was there using scare tactics to ensure I was going to pay for them, tried to take my name and info down, suggested that maybe we should only do 3 stitches instead of 4 if I wasn't going to give them my info. Probably extra pushy because I was drunk. They billed me thousands, I gave them the $100 in my wallet and walked out the door. My experience in Mexico for basically everything related to healthcare has been superior to the USA, from drugs to child birth to surgery to other healthcare fields like dentistry. I'd probably rather get cancer here, too. I know a Mexican here with a brain tumor that gets operated on every year. He can walk in to a public hospital, but he prefers the private ones. His last operation, he paid $1,500 cash. I don't even want to know what that would cost in the USA. Probably the rest of your life in servitude. The USA is nice when you have a cushy white collar job like most HNers, and that's what I don't like. I don't want to work a cushy job all my life. I want to live off my savings for years at a time, live on a beach, take risks, start things, yet not lose half my savings when I have an accident. As far as I'm concerned, the USA can't deliver that.

jaunkst 7y ago

Yikes. Think I'm going to learn to do my own stiches.