My Small Claims court experience (Health Care Fees)

[AwakeAtLast]

I had to go to Small Claims court today. For me it stemmed from my insurance company and the hospital pointing fingers at each other while neither was doing anything. In the meantime the hospital sent me to Small Claims Court.

Basically if I pay what I owe before the next court date I will not have to pay any extra except for a minor court fee. Never mind the fact that today was first day I found out exactly what I owe.

As I sat in the "holding room", though, I realized that many were not so fortunate.

The room only held people being sued by this one hospital for outstanding fees. The girl sitting next to me worked for Sam's Club. There were single mothers complaining about not receiving child support. There were whole families who obviously had more than a few medical problems. A few were in a similar situation as me.

This room was full. If I had not shown up early I would not have found a place to sit. All of these people did not have much to pay - it was obvious. It was eye opening and sad to see. I am sure that tomorrow will bring another room full of people sitting before a corporate lawyer who is hired to get blood from the turnips.

[napi21]

1. What kind of fees are they trying to collect? Is this for the

difference beween what the ins. co paid & what the hosp. says the bill was?

[AwakeAtLast]

2. I think so

but the insurance company has messed around so much that they were not able to produce a final report to me. Needless to say I am not the only person to go through this in my job, and my employer just got rid of them and went to a different company as of Jan. 1. Yay!

This all goes back to a procedure in early 2008. Oh, the phone calls! I was originally billed over $3,000.00 and was told today I only owe $400. Big difference!

[liberalhistorian]

3. Several years ago, the WSJ, of all papers, published a series

on medical debt collection that showed that hospitals and clinics were among the top five most aggressive collectors in the nation. Many were even using the legal method known as "body attachment", having people arrested and throwing them in jail for unpaid medical bills, a method rarely used by even the most brutal, aggressive, obnoxious collection agencies. And most of it was against lower-income blue-collar workers who were uninsured or underinsured and who had had medical emergencies such as heart attacks and appendicitis. Given that they were uninsured, they were charged thousands of dollars more for the same procedures, since insurers negotiate group discounts with hospitals, and hospitals were not at all shy about taking whatever assets the person may have had, no matter how small or if it was all they had, or put liens on their property, etc., etc. I know I have that article about it bookmarked here, I'll go back and try to find it and post it in a few minutes.

And being in the legal field, I've experienced more than a few cases of desperate people being railroaded by hospitals and doctors and their collectrolls for money that they just didn't have, for medical emergencies and/or conditions that simply had to be treated. Hubby is an attorney, and I defend attorneys endlessly, for the most part, but neither he nor I will even consider defending the corporate bloodsucking scum called collections attorneys, particularly medical collections attorneys, who use their skills and knowledge to screw people over rather than help them. And they often make a lot more money doing that than those attorneys, such as hubby and some of my past bosses, who try to help desperate people in need.

It is my firm belief that not only should hospitals and doctors not be permitted to sue such people, but medical bills should not even be permitted to be put on credit reports, period. You can thank Reagan for allowing that, by the way. It isn't as if people charged goodies they wanted but didn't need and couldn't afford and then just decided they could have such goodies for free and stiff the bank by not paying the bill. This is medical treatment, a matter of human welfare and, in some cases, life and death.

[AwakeAtLast]

4. Thank you for your insight

I can honestly say I was surprised by the events of this day.

[liberalhistorian]

5. OK, here's the thread I found in my old bookmarks

that gives some detail about it. It wasn't the one I thought it was, but it'll do for now. It may be an old thread, but it's still relevant because it's still happening, nothing's changed:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=996183

Pretty sickening, huh? To seize bank accounts and garnish wages of those who have little because they had the nerve to get sick. Civilized countries don't bankrupt their sick.

[AwakeAtLast]

6. From '04!

This has gone on too long. :(

Thanks for finding it!

[davsand]

7. Here is a link to the original WSJ article on the subject:

http://webreprints.djreprints.com/858821310103.html

To update a tiny bit, the hospital property tax exemption case mentioned in that article has been in the court system this entire time. I went to the IL Supreme Court for the Oral Arguments in that case in late September of 09. We anticipate a decision sometime in the next couple months.

Locally, since Lucette's article hit, we have seen a few changes in the hospitals' behavior. They have stopped using Body Attachments and they actually put up signs in their ER rooms about the availability of charity care. One hospital actually advertises the program now. The actual amount of charity care has increased some--but so have the costs associated with medical care.

It was a personal hope of mine that with Obama's election we'd see enough change in health care policy that our work locally would become a moot point. Given the direction the debate has taken, I am starting to think that our work locally may have more impact than we ever anticipated.


Laura

[liberalhistorian]

8. Thank you, Laura, that's just what I was looking

for! I thought I'd had it bookmarked, but I guess not. I remember discussing this subject with you way back then and hoping at least some things have changed. I've moved to a different state since then and now live in a rural area where the hospitals are a bit more charitable, for the most part. They have to be, or they wouldn't have any patients. However, things have not only not changed in regards to the hospitals in my area in my old state of Ohio, they've gotten even worse. Ever since the "non-profit" hospital built a huge new building in the ritzier part of town, it's gotten ever more difficult for the uninsured, underinsured and those without much money, and they've gotten even worse with collections.