The Pancreatitis Chronicles
Take a moment and refresh your memory by reading this post, specifically the update to it. I just received a follow-up email from the author of that update, and I’d like to post it here.
Lee I am the guy that had the Pancreatitis that you featured in your post on right-thinking and morewatch.
I just wanted to let you know how the billing for this went. After spending 3 days in the hospital - in a private room none the less. After getting infused with bag after bag of drugs to get my body back on track and getting more morphine than an addict on the street for the pain I got the bill for the treatment.
$12,625.35
A hell of alot more than I can pay thats for sure. Hey your co-admin has Michael Moore to thank, I have the City and County of Denver and it’s taxpayers. I was told to go to the finacial aid office and after all is said and done guess how much I owe?
$100.10 Thats it $12,525.25 paid for by some unknown persons somewhere. I did not ask where they get the funding for this program. But thats not the case. The 100.10 that I am paying are proccessing fees! Fees that cannot be waived and that I must pay. So actually this financial assistance paid the ENTIRE BILL!
Who the hell says we don’t have free health care when it is required? And as I said before my care was top notch (allthough I was asleep most the time) in a state of the art hospital KNOWING I COULD NOT PAY THE BILL!
I can send you copies of the bills if you need them.
No, that won’t be necessary. I’ve had the same thing happen to me. When my father was admitted to the hospital in in severe cardiac failure, one of the first things my mother said was that we didn’t have insurance. The head doctor, a world-renowned cardio-thoracic surgeon, said to my mom, “Don’t worry about the bill. Your husband will get all the treatment he needs. We’ll worry about the bill later.”
Not exactly the “dumped at Skid Row” scenario that Moore paints, is it? Now, the Skid Row dumping in Los Angeles absolutely happened, and it was disgusting. But he painted at as the norm, when it is clearly the exception, and the public was outraged about it when it came to light. (Oddly, that aspect of the case didn’t make it into the movie. What a strange coincidence.)
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You know, I for one am a member of Kaiser Permanente through my employer and I love their services and care. I had three procedures on my heart over the course of about 5 years and each one came with a price tag of over $20,000 each! My out of pocket expenses each time? Around $75.00. I know that if I need to see a Dr. the same day I’m hurt or sick, I can see one without having to jump through hoops or go through my primary care physician first.
My wife’s granparents live in Canada and they constantly have to drive down into Washington state for surgeries and procedures because the red tape, wait lists and risks in Canada are too much! Sure, the meds are cheap, but some illnesses need surgery and not bottles and bottles of cheap pills. And here’s the kicker: if a Canadian tries to pay for a physician’s services out of their own pocket, they get penalized.
All I can say is God bless America!!