An enormous medical bill can trigger a wave of panic, but experts say patients should attack the problem with a plan.
Medical charges sent to David White, who after kidney surgery got hit with a lot of extra charges, are seen at his home in Temple Hills, Md., Monday, June 26, 2023. A startling invoice that arrived in the mail may not be what you wind up paying. Errors or slow insurance payments may have inflated the total. Even if its accurate, financial aid or other assistance might help pare it. That startling invoice that arrived in the mail may not be what you wind up paying.
Donovan recommends comparing the bill with your insurer’s explanation of benefits. That’s a document the insurer sends that explains how your coverage will apply to the care you received. It can give you a sense for what you may still owe based on your deductible or the plan’s out-of-pocket maximum.Someone at the hospital may have mistakenly entered the wrong code for the care you received or duplicated it. Request an itemized bill from the hospital to see if that happened.
The law offers protection for most emergency care by basically requiring that patients receive in-network coverage with no additional billing from the provider. It also protects patients from huge bills for lab work or an out-of-network anesthesiologist when the patient was treated at an in-network hospital.
A case manager told White that a government database was causing complications with the claim, and this sort of thing had happened before to people with his condition. She also helped him file paperwork to correct the mistake. Be very wary of any sort of medical credit card a provider may offer, said John McNamara, a principal assistant director with the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Those cards may come with high interest rates or terms that can hurt the patient financially if the debt isn’t fully paid in a certain time frame.
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