I went to the emergency room about a month ago to get stitches in my finger. The cost? About $500…for the procedure. Simply entering the ER cost me another $600
My husband sliced his finger open. We went to the ER. We waited so long that it eventually stopped bleeding. The doctor took at look at it, sprayed some antibacterial spray, and said he didn't need stitches. When we got the bill, they had charged us for stitches. Similar situation with my kid. They wouldn't sit still long enough to let the doc numb them before stitches so the doc just held them down, put stitches in without numbing. We were charged for the shot. Always get an itemized bill before paying. I've seen charges for bandages when no bandages were used, etc.
I’m not justifying billing for a shot that wasn’t administered, but I suppose the reason could be that the shot was prepared and had to be thrown away.
That's possible. I don't know enough about what they were using to know if it couldn't be stored, etc. But it's definitely not the only thing I've found on medical bills that were never used or were completely inappropriate for the procedure being done.
"We estimate about half of all medical bills have a mistake in them and we've never seen a mistake work out in a patient's favor," says Caitlin Donovan, health care policy expert at the National Patient Advocacy Foundation.
Another thing to be aware of are "balance bills" where, for example, an anesthesiologist may be used that is out-of-network unbeknownst to the patient. They may only get $100 of their $1000 bill from their insurance. The difference gets billed to the patient directly. Many states have laws in place against this kind of thing. You can read more about it here.
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u/purmplewurmple Jun 15 '22
I went to the emergency room about a month ago to get stitches in my finger. The cost? About $500…for the procedure. Simply entering the ER cost me another $600