Unfair medical bill

[lavmarenpo]

What is the name of your state? florida

End of february, I was send to the hospital for a kidney infection (3days stay). I have insurance, and they took care of a little over $1000, which leave me with about $15,000.00 to pay. This amount does not include the physicians, laboratory, the clinic that I went to, etc... that we already paid from our pocket.
Scared of this bill, I requested the detail and ...oh suprise!, I 've got charged for things that I did not get (ex: 1 litter of IV antibiotic/day, fever relief 8 times a day, scans...). So, I filled for an audit of the account with a letter requesting explainations about all this (why did they practice X-ray of my chest? was that policy or running the bill higher? )
Anyway, I never got any answers and so until after many calls to the hospital, I received phone calls from debt creditors, requesting the whole amount right now. I finally learnd that I got $6.90 refund from my audit, no letter, no explaination, no help. I asked then what was going on and the only answer was, :"well, it is in your medical record, so there is nothing you can do except pay your bill".
Again the debt creditors are calling, not willing to understand that something got wrong in the process and that recovering financially from "frances", and trying to find legal help is not a piece of cake. I swear, next time one of us get sick,even if we are dying, we'll fly back to europe, because this entire bill will certainly covert a 3 months stay.
Please, send me advice and answers.
thank you for your time.

 

[Ummonx]

you need to provide more information

What type of insurance do you have? why did they only pay 1k? do you have a 15k deductible? were you out of network? do you have an HMO?

 

[lavmarenpo]

My insurance is part of the cobra, I have a $200.00 deduc., and a $15.00 copay on office visite. As the rest of it, I only have a $4000.00 limit of coverage.

 

[Ummonx]

first find out why they only paid 1k of it.
Second is send a cease and desist letter the the collection agency. you can find them online.
Third ask for validation of the debt
Fourth, dispute the debt in writing for the services that you did not recieve.

That should get them off you back for a couple of months.

 

[Ladynred]

Oh you DEFINITELY need to do more than swallow that junk handed to you by the hospital about your audit. Just because is in your medical record does NOT mean you can't fight it and I most certainly would ! If you were charged for procedures, medications and supplies that were NOT PROVIDED you have every right to fight it, you will have to go to the hospital and sit on someones desk until you get help in resolving it. Every hospital has procedures to handle this type of dispute and letting them get away with what they've sent you so far doesn't cut it.