Sicko

We watched the Michael Moore documentary on healthcare, Sicko, on Friday.  It was rather timely since the bills for my crash last month just started appearing in the mailbox.   Moore is always over the top, but he usually puts some light on the craziness in our society, and the healthcare industry in this country definitely is out of whack in many ways.

The first bill I have received is from the hospital for my treatment in the ER (but not for the trauma doctors, all billing separately), the operation (but not the surgeon), and my 61 +/- hour stay.   The total is tickling, hard, the six figure range and some of the charges seem a bit excessive.  The 30 min or less with PT on my second day, basically them watching me get up and hobble on a walker then crutches, comes in at a bit over $500.  The OT person who followed along but did not really do much other than say ‘good job’ is apparently worth almost $700.  The PT person the next day, the one who took me for one lap of the floor and a couple of steps, is charged at $600.   There is a full body CT scan at $25K, and a separate head CT scan at $5K.  Isn’t the head part of the body?  Couldn’t they do it all at once for one price?

The craziest part of it all is how the numbers change due to my insurance.  There is a ‘contractual adjustment’ to the near six figure price, an adjustment that deducts 80% of the price from the total, with the remainder being allocated to the insurance carrier and to me.   Which is a bit scary; if I am John Doe without insurance I would be on the hook for nearly $100K just for the hospital, but since I have insurance yours truly and the insurance company together only have to come up with 20% of that amount.  Now that is truly ‘Sicko’.   And it really points to the need for healthcare/insurance reform with universal coverage.