Costs of Being Treated (My Ambulance Ride Cost Over $2,800)

[JamesonCourage]

That'll be $150.00.

/ragequit

They didn't do an EKG?

Nope, just blood pressure twice. Once right away, and once a few minutes later to make sure I was calming down (I was).

Well, they taxi driver couldn't monitor your vitals while enroute.

That's why I mentioned that they only took my blood pressure. They weren't keeping track of my vitals. (They might've for the woman who ran into me, since she was on a gurney in the same vehicle.)

Sometimes companies in the healthcare field do what's called balance billing. They bill the insurance, the insurance company pays, and then they bill you. Sometimes it's a mistake, sometime it's not. There are companies that hope that you would be intimidated by a collection agency threatening to ruin your credit for a few dollars, and pay the bill. In the state of Florida it's illegal, and I'm guessing it's illegal in other states, but who knows.

Yeah, they did threaten my credit, but I threatened to hang up if they so much as brought up me paying again, and it seemed to work. The guy on the phone did tell me that me paying for it was the best way to deal with the situation for everyone involved, though. That didn't make me happy, either.

 

[Homicidal_Squirrel]

/ragequit

What? You only got charged for one hour. Not that it took me an hour, but I scheduled your response for an hour in case it actually took an hour. I may have left the computer for a few minutes... or thirty, but still, you had that whole hour to yourself.

Nope, just blood pressure twice. Once right away, and once a few minutes later to make sure I was calming down (I was).

That's why I mentioned that they only took my blood pressure. They weren't keeping track of my vitals. (They might've for the woman who ran into me, since she was on a gurney in the same vehicle.)

Well, your blood pressure is one of he readings they take when they are taking your vitals. They could also do your respiratory rate, and you may not have noticed them taking it.

Yeah, they did threaten my credit, but I threatened to hang up if they so much as brought up me paying again, and it seemed to work. The guy on the phone did tell me that me paying for it was the best way to deal with the situation for everyone involved, though. That didn't make me happy, either.

My girlfriend works for an insurance company for the elderly. You would be amazed, or probably not, how often balance billing happens. Doctor offices are constantly doing it. Dentists are notoriously bad with that stuff down here. The companies also figure that the elderly won't put up a fight and will be intimidated easily. The collections people always say the best thing is for you to just pay it off. It's he best thing for them. My girlfriend told me of a doctor's office that had done that to a lot of the members at her company. The last complaint was for a decent amount of money. They kept trying to charge the member, even after the insurance company had cleared things up. The complaint escalated, and the doctor was kicked out of the insurance. This is a Human company, and the are huge. That doctor lost a crapton of money. The member didn't have to pay anything, and the doctor got screwed with other stuff. Balance billing being illegal and all, there are other consequences for doctors when it is proven that they have done it on purpose.
Next time they call you, if they call you, tell them that as of 2008, balance billing is illegal in the state of California and you're going to put their ass in a sling.

By the way, that'll be another $150. I know what you're thinking, but I don't accept insurance. It's all private pay.

 

[Dioltach]

I just remembered a conversation I had with my insurance company last autumn, before I went to the States on holiday. The travel agency had been urging me to take out some quite expensive insurance, and I reckoned I'd be covered under my general medical insurance. Turns out that Dutch general medical insurance covers medical costs everywhere in the world except the US: simply because the costs there are disproportionately high. Luckily my travel insurance includes worldwide cover (in fact, the insurance company told me that if I ever needed any medical treatment in the Netherlands that wasn't covered by my standard medical insurance, I should just go to another town -- visit my parents, for example -- and then claim it under my travel insurance).

 

[Viking Bastard]

Here the ambulance service is run by the Red Cross with additional support from the fire department.

It doesn't cost anything, as such, but if you call an ambulance for something deemed "unnecessary"--for example, I know a very anxious girl, somewhat of a hypochondriac, who called an ambulance when she was having a panic attack--you're fined 20000 ISK (approx. $180).

 

[Scott DeWar]

Was her panic attack during the volcano eruption? That would be justified, I would think.

 

[Viking Bastard]

Was her panic attack during the volcano eruption? That would be justified, I would think.

No, it was over a scheduling conflict. Very tightly wound, that girl.

And it wasn't a very impressive eruption (I assume you're talking about Eyjafjallajökull a few years back), as much as it was mildly annoying.

 

[Ahnehnois]

It's worth considering that the people involved in this are often making little to no money.

You've got your EMT volunteers, and then they train to be paramedics and struggle to find jobs which are low-paying and have a high burnout rate. Most of the support staff at the hospital are making close to minimum wage, the nurses are trapped in low-paying jobs with little possibility of advancement, and even doctors are largely residents who aren't making much and have gigantic loans to pay. Even the fully credentialed docs at the top aren't exactly loaded compared to their peers in other fields. On the whole, almost everyone in the process has put in an enormous amount of time and effort, probably taken out large educational loans, and is seeing very little of that $2800.

It does beg the question of where exactly all of that money goes.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

It does beg the question of where exactly all of that money goes.

Some of it it liability insurance, some of it is maintenance and/or replacement of equipment. Some of the stuff has limited shelf-lives, so has to be replaced at a regular rate, regardless of whether or not it is used.

Their are training costs, too.

Etc.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Some of it it liability insurance, some of it is maintenance and/or replacement of equipment. Some of the stuff has limited shelf-lives, so has to be replaced at a regular rate, regardless of whether or not it is used.

Their are training costs, too.

Etc.

None of those factors applies uniquely to the U.S. There are quite a few specific factors that lead to higher costs here than elsewhere.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Certainly, those problems are not unique in general, but they are unique in the details:

...like our higher liability insurance costs, somewhat driven upwards by or litigious society and the fact that insurance is more regulated at the state than federal level. That means a company doing business in more than one state may have to have a larger legal department and/or attorneys on retainer in each state.

...our services are offered to a less homogenized populace, which decreases efficiency at all levels of our healthcare system, thus driving up costs.

...a different and costlier pharmaceutical approval process, which means that certain supplies are costlier here than in other countries.

...a historical pattern in the American medical system of over investment in certain equipment which leads to those assets never quite being paid off before they "must" be replaced...