Thursday, February 21, 2013

Time, CNN decode a hospital charge list

Related: Who profits from your exorbitant hospital charges?

A hospital's charge list is the outrageous collection of full price charges paid only by the "uneducated, unrepresented or uninsured." Insurance companies negotiate steep "discounts" for their members. Medicare has its own fee schedule. Examples of the inscrutable nomenclature on hospital bills:
Mucous recovery system — tissues
Cough supression device  — Teddy Bear
Oral administration fee — pill cup, identical to a ketchup cup at McDonalds
A hospital Teddy bear can run $120-$190. As for the pill cups, one patient racked up $5,000 in charges for them during her hospital stay.

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