Surprise Emergency Room Bill

brandon8283 said
Our healthcare system is a joke, and anyone who thinks MFA won't be a drastic upgrade from what we have now is lying to themselves.

I have a story that's not quite as extreme as the one above, but not far off.

A few years back, around 3AM, my wife began having an allergic reaction to something. Her face began to swell and turned red and splotchy. I gave her a couple of benadryl to help with the symptoms and we kept an eye out.

However, a few minutes later, her tongue began to swell and her throat started to tighten. In case this was the beginnings of anaphylaxis, I took her to the emergency room.

We explained the symptoms and because it was so early, we got a room fairly quickly. However, we basically sat in that room alone for another hour waiting on a doctor. Thankfully, by that time, the benadryl seemed to have had some effect, and her symptoms were starting to subside.

When the doctor finally came in, he looked her over and said "Yep, it does look like she had an allergic reaction. The benadryl was a good idea." We were sent home with no treatment or prescription (as her symptoms were improving), no recommendations as to what could have caused the reaction, and a total time with the doctor of less than 5 minutes.

We received a bill a few weeks later for nearly $900. With insurance.

ER co payments are ridiculously high no doubt. But show me a govt program that is fiscally responsible and maybe I could get on board with this healthcare for all thing. There is no doubt that healthcare would be rationed out and we could no longer have the "my body, my choice" take on healthcare. Unfortunately, the ER is not a place to get the answers you were looking for. Proper follow up is what was needed. If she was not in distress, and improving and had taken Benadryl, I'm not sure much more needed to be done. If you don't know what caused the reaction, there is absolutely no way for the physician to figure it out in an ER setting.

And if you think the poor are not receiving good medical treatment, you are mistaken. The amount of people on medicaid right now is insane. We need interpreters onsite at all times because a lot of these people don't speak English at all. Like none. They walk out with no bill at all. Colonoscopy screenings, surgery, etc. To me, "its amazing that people who think we can't afford to pay for hospitals, doctors, and medications, somehow think we can afford to pay for doctors, hospital, medications and a government bureaucracy to administer it.