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I was going to call this monday to reschedule an appointment i’d made about 3 weeks ago with the clinic where my Primary Physician is. It’s for my yearly checkup for the asthma meds and whatnot. It was supposed to be today, the 8th.
What i had gotten? Was that my appointment was canceled since i hadn’t paid them back the deductibles from last year fast enough for them. I was discharged from the clinic, so the fun part will be getting back INTO it so i can get my asthma meds in a week. Or else i’m pretty much expecting a major asthma attack with the high pollen presence in the areas i live by. That is–if i’m not able to get anymore meds.
So i have to call and basically argue with billing and hope me giving them maybe 10$ a month or so (when i’m trying to get a new place at the moment!) will convince them to let me make an appointment again with my Doctor. I’ve never heard of this happening before. So i can’t pay the difference? No more preventative care for you! Go ahead and have an asthma attack, you’re poor! Even though i work IN the health care industry. I can care for my patients but not for myself.
Lovely, eh? Yet another thing to toss the poor into the vicious cycle of debt and bad health. A lot of my problem from the last six months was also the deteriorating health of my father, and his unfortunate death in may. Of course, that does not compute in the world of the bean counters in that part of that particular network of clinics and hospitals.
Scratch it up as yet another reason for a strong public option, and eventually single payer. Just one of many reasons i support it.
10 Comments
(((alias)))
What fuckery. I hope things work out well for you.
I have had a similar experience, or one that has the same ring to it. I have a very high deductible but my insurance company will pay 100% of one physical per year. So, I made the appointment and went armed with a few concerns to discuss with the doctor. To my surprise, when I got the bill, the medical facility had charged me for three – 3 – visits to the doctor. I was charged for preventative care- the physical, which the insurance company did pay for- an office visit and a surgical consult. Each question I asked my doctor triggered a new billing event, so I had three office visits in one. When I asked for an explanation, the facility told me they had done me a favor. I didn’t have to go home, make a new appointemnt for each concern, return to the clinic two more times to talk to my doctor about a health issue- the second office visit- and a funny looking mole- the surgical consult. After a few weeks the medical facility sent me a letter telling me not to make any more appointments unless I could pay all I owe the clinic immediately- and the charge was well over $600 for this “physical”- and write a check for the entire new visit. Thanks, Marshfield.
That sort of micro-billing is popular but fraudulent. Your physician ought to have told you that each question you ask is charged as a separate visit. No adequate prior disclosure, no enforceable charge.
It’s part of the cat’s cradle that is health care in America today. It is one response physicians have to maltreatment by insurance companies and government reimbursers, who dictate “reasonable and customary” charges for the services doctors provide when medically necessary. It’s really a variation on the salesman’s game of “find the hat” – burying unreimbursable expenses in an expense report so that they are undetectable and are, in fact, reimbursed.
Credible reform of health care would prohibit it.
It’s something we should demand as part of the public option, or as one of the several follow-ups that will be needed after it’s in place. Because this reform needs to be about health care, not just insurance companies’ role in paying for and restricting access to it.
alias, great post, thank you.
Apologies if this is unhelpful, but have you considered contacting the manufacturer of the asthma medication you purchase? They may be a natural ally in the process, which may include getting asthma scripts from a non-physician prescriber?
Apologies for my ignorance if this is unhelpful.
They can only help in terms of copayment help with the medications. It’s on me to get a script for them to send me a voucher to use, which is the usual process i see among my patients. I really want to keep seeing this particular physician, so at the moment i’m going to see what i can haggle with their billing people. If its impossible(as in they want all 200$ right away and NOW)then i take my business elsewhere. I’ll just write a nasty letter to their billing people saying that they lost a regular patient with these shenangians and i’ll go to another one outside their network.
alias, what an awful way to treat patients. I have never heard of this happening before either.
My best to you!
(((alias)))
Your experience is just another example of why we need the Public Option with no co-pays. Co-pays are one of the major reasons people don’t see their Doctor… They just can’t afford them period and when they get really sick they end up in the Emergency room!
SINGLE PAYER! It is the only way Americans can compete in the World Market… All other major countries provide comprehensive Health Care. It is the Republicans standing in the way of Good Health Care in Our country!!
Great Diary Alias!!
Recommended!!
I stopped going to doctors who were all about seeing the most number of patients possible to get the most billings. I think that my PC doctor must be poor because he spends however long you need. He actually has a sign to that effect in the waiting room. His staff also doesn’t bother collecting the co-pay. They just bill us. We are lucky.
Good diary, alias.
I don’t think it was my doc’s decision. It was more likely the billing people at the clinic that made that decision. His nurses were perfectly happy to make that appointment for me 3 weeks ago. Now i have to do all this running around instead, because they decided on this idea of getting their money. It’s still a rotten practice. I refuse to go to the ER unless absolutely necessary, so i won’t be paying them more than i can afford and i told them as much earlier.
I’ll probably update tomorrow night when i finish off the last of this insanity. *yawns*