Paying for Hospital Bills Are a Growing Challenge

By: Sara Sindelar

With the health care reform making ways paying the health care bills are getting tougher. There is great confusion on insurance and what is covered by policy owner’s plans. The layer of confusion gets greater when unheard of fees are billed.

There are many additional fees that people are unaware of. Fees like a facility fee for seeing a doctor due to the use of a facility. These fees are for the patient who is a member of the clinics that are affiliated with hospital systems. This fee is on top of the labor of the doctor. A lot of these fees are not covered in insurance and therefore become out of pocket expense.

There is great confusion on payment of different types of care. Urgent care facilities are not the same thing as Emergency rooms and therefore the billing is different. The system causes great perplexity among patients and can lead to people not getting the care they need if they feel they can no pay for it. Patients feel they are being duped with later bills coming from senders they did not know were involved in the payment. Patients want and need a clearer picture of what the payment is when they go to receive care.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703819904574555723216593610.html

http://www.fox21online.com/news/wisconsin-lawmakers-look-health-care-facility-charges

http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Daily-Reports/2009/November/25/Hospital-Fees-Medical-bankruptcy.aspx