Why YSK: Most hospitals send a summary bill (for example pharmacy: $5,000) hoping you’ll panic and just pay it. These are usually full of errors or huge markups. Before you pay anything, call the billing department and ask for an itemized bill with CPT codes. This will not only force a human to review it, but it also gives you the ability to spot BS. I tried this last year and the bill dropped by about 30% literally just because I asked, so don’t let them rip you off.
YSK you don’t get a medical bill in a civilised country.
no true, you might get a token bill of like 100€ which the bog standard insurance probably covers if you just ask about it.
Before I moved all I had to pay for was the parking if I parked at a hospital. Now I don’t even have to do that.
Where I live, they refuse to give me an invoice at all…
so like, how do they expect to get paid?
I found this non-profit from the Pluralistic blog. It’s there to help you find discounts that hospitals are obligated to give some patients, but aren’t easily found.
Here’s the post it came from.
https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/22/optimized-for-unoptimizability/
We live in Denmark. My wife lost her job at a senior home due to stress. 3 years later, breast cancer diagnosis followed by a quick operation. Shes waiting for the radiation sessions now. In the US, we would probably have gone bankrupt. Sorry for you guys.
I had a spontaenous pneumothorax in my late 20s, only reason I had insurance was because it was the year of the Obamacare mandate. I was unemployed so the state I was in gave me free insurance. I had about $330k worth of surgeries and paid … $19 for an optional medication.
Would have definitely bankrupted me.
And my mother, who is buried under her own medical bills, told me “you should have been bankrupted.”
She apologized later but that’s the mentality. We don’t speak anymore.
High prices are due to government regulation.
The consumer is saved by the government from problems caused by government regulation.
The consumer thanks for government for saving them from the problem the government created.
High prices are due to a lack of government regulations.
Pharma companies can set the prices according to what people are willing to pay. And people are willing to pay everything if it will save their lifes.
Pharma companies can set the prices to whatever they want because they have government protected monopolies over their products.
I thought generics were handled relatively similarly in the EU and the US, but apparently the US does grant a bunch of exclusivities, on top of patents.
However the biggest difference between those health systems still seems to be how providers bargain for lower prices.
In the US, insurances bargain for rebates. That means that if you buy a drug with insurance the insurance only pays a small percentage of the drug price. They are still allowed to demand copay on the list price. So often the insurance makes a profit in that transaction. But if you try to go around insurance you have to pay the full list price and will pay even more.
Over here, the universal healthcare providers bargain with the pharma companies to lower the list price. And with a much greater bargaining power to boot.
However the biggest difference between those health systems still seems to be how providers bargain for lower prices.
I disagree, that would be true if they were selling televisions or something, if you don’t like the price buy a different brand; but this isn’t possible on exclusive drugs. Hospitals have zero room negotiate by shopping around on a patented medication. Their literal only trick to lower prices is by government legislation.
Universal healthcare providers sometimes choose to cover drugs or treatments that have slightly worse outcomes instead. The treatment that was state of the art 10 years ago probably still works just fine.
Patents last 20 years. But most of that time, a drug is in trials.
Providers can also choose not to cover other drugs by the same company, if they refuse to budge. Not being able to sell any drugs across an entire country would be a big problem for companies.
Onces you get the itemized bill you should just not pay that too lol
There are hundreds of movies about US soldiers being heroes by killing their enemies
How many movies are there about US citizens being fucked over by hospitals and insurance for more decades than I’ve been alive? I don’t know of any.
This really encapsulates the US in two paragraphs
Breaking Bad started out about that. Was the whole reason he broke bad in the first place!
How many movies are there about US citizens being fucked over by hospitals and insurance
Acktually this is not a movie
Yay, you’re right! We got one! Now we need some 10.000 more and we might have the same amount of movies out there about killing enemies
So glad I got universal heath care
So what if my elective mri took 7 months? Atleast I don’t have medical debt!!!
American here.
I pay dearly for my health care and I still had to wait 6 months for an appointment with a specialist only to find out immediately after sitting down with him that I had been sent to the wrong place AND charged extra for it.
Don’t forget 1 grand gets you about 10 minutes of rush time to speak
Waits are just as long here in the US, PLUS we have to pay huge fees. System is fucked.
It’s broken in some way or form everywhere
I will simply continue to not use healthcare unless I think I’m actually dying.
I would stop.the sentence at do not pay. Transfer assets to relatives that courts cannot seize
The problem however is many places demand payment up front before they will do the procedures just for this very reason.
You guys pay your medical bills?
Last time, I was told to go to a specialist. Called, was told the soonest appointment was 6 MONTHS OUT. Waited 6 months in pain. Went. Was there for 5 minutes when the specialist looked at my record and said I wasn’t supposed to have been sent to him, and sent me packing. Charged me $420 for that “appointment”. Never paid it. Don’t know if they ever garnished my wages or not. Never heard about it.
I’m not going to help them fuck me.
Each time I’ve asked for an itemized bill for hospital visits it’s only made the price higher…
Tylenol, 2 pills: $250
“Just write it off” -comment from yesterday on medical insolvency.
YSK This is only relevant for the USA.
And some 3rd world countries. Let that sink in.
No shit
It still boggles my mind that Americans believe this is normal.
We’re a heavily propagandized nation.
A lot of people know our healthcare is fucked, but many have accepted it because they think the alternative is worse. Because they’ve been told so by healthcare lobbyists.
Recently I watched a moron complain that her elective fat loss injections are not going to be covered properly anymore. This is a person who is boasted on many occasions that they love their private health care and would never trade it for anything.
we don’t. we know it’s insanity.
i personally have been trying to change it for 25 years. i’m tired.
Because the word tax is a Boogeyman. Paying 2x as much for half the value is a good thing because the cheaper version is called a tax …
It doesn’t have to be. Here we have mandatory insurance. So it’s still called a premium.
Republicans will call it a tax, with lots of spooky oooOooOoOos and that’s how it will be known. Like they did with Obamacare which people hate, yet don’t want the ACA removed.
I think a majority of us don’t but our democracy is a sham so it doesn’t matter what we believe.
Follow-up question: when will the world’s most heavily-armed populace decide that enough is enough and start shooting their oppressors instead of eachother?
I dunno. Next time I see a gun owner I will ask.
I do know what happened to Keith Porter Jr and Alex Pretti, both armed.
And its worth noting that the most heavily-armed populace in the world would be facing off against the most heavily-armed government in the world.
I don’t think it’s normal at all. I think it’s probably going to kill me one day because I have no interest in interacting with a system where they’re apparently just making shit up with 1000s of my dollars.
and if you complain about it, you are a bad American.
Domestic terrorist
Here it is normal. Most of us do recognize that it shouldn’t be though.
I don’t know if it’s changed, but hospitals use to hang up on you if you ask for a quote on an operation. They don’t want you shopping around.
Amerikkka moment…
