2010-03-16

Hospital Adventure: The Aftermath.




So last week I wrote a post about how I had to go to the hospital.
The woman from the financial desk actually came to the emergency room to assure me that since I was registered in the system, I wouldn't have to worry about my lack of insurance, that I was eligible for free care or something of that sort...so I wasn't too worried.
Well, that is until I received two separate bills, one from the ambulance company, one from Jordan Hospital...for a grand total of $2413.

Let me give you a brief outline of the care I received:

-One less than 2 mile ride in an ambulance. I walked onto the ambulance myself, sat on the stretcher, was buckled in only as a safety requirement. At $27.50 per mile, this ride added up to $55 even. Which would be fine, except for the base fee of $1500. No testing or treatment received. This is the cost of simply stepping foot into an ambulance. God knows what medflight costs....I tried to google it but couldn't find a straight-up figure.

-One urology test, one other basic test. These two procedures were broken up into twelve separate parts, with twelve separate prices, with the addition of setting foot into the emergency room (a price tag of $386 dollars alone)
For a grand total of $858.

Out of the 5 hours I spent at the hospital, approximately 20 minutes of that was spent with actual testing and interaction with the nurses, doctors, etc. The remaining 4 hours and 40 minutes were spent in a random room, sitting on a bed and waiting endlessly for a glass of water that never arrived.
In the end, the doctor did not even come into my room to inform me of my diagnosis, what medicine he was putting me on, the side effects, so on and so forth.

Instead I got a nurse, who handed me an Rx and told me to go to a pharmacy.
She apparently had no clue that the doctor had failed to show up to discuss the results with me. When I informed her of this, she shrugged and started reading off of the papers that were handed to her..."take this in such a way , for five days, etc etc."

At which point, I got angry...it's a rare thing for me to get angry with people I don't know personally. When I interrupted her and demanded to know what exactly I was diagnosed with, and asked her what to do about the Rx with my lack of insurance, she replied:

"Well can't your parents pay for it?"
Me: "No"
Nurse: "Why not?"
Me: "BECAUSE THEY ARE POOR".
Nurse: "Well don't get huffy..."

At this point I didn't know that the Rx meds were within my financial reach. They only cost me a total of about $40. Fine. Though the bigger issue to me would be the nurse being so intrusive as to ask a 27 year old woman why her parents couldn't pay for her Rx meds...but whatever...

And now I have a fantastic new debt.

Today, I did the math in my head. And here is a factual, non-exaggerated conclusion:

If time were not an issue, for the price of $2413, I could have:
Flown economy to Japan.
Taken the airport shuttle to a hospital.
Received treatment immediately without insurance.
Stayed overnight at the hospital without insurance.
Received Rx meds immediately, at hospital without insurance.
Flown home.
And saved HUNDREDS OF FUCKING DOLLARS.

United States of America, land of "freedom" and don't get sick if you are poor...
I FUCKING HATE YOU.






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