In 2021 over 880 of you submitted ideas for KHN-NPR’s Invoice of the Month survey series, trusting us to cover the two most personal topics in life: your health and your money. friend. We are extremely grateful. Ours pile of bills and the stories – which have grown steadily to nearly 5,000 since February 2018 – show us that the financial costs of America’s healthcare facilities burden too many people, and that our health system often better at promoting its own financial interests than protecting the public.
The stories we tell in 2021 reflect some practices that have been around for decades and others that are new. We met Kyunghee Lee who wanted to know why her arthritis injection bill was so sudden 10 times when her doctor’s office moved up one floor. And we met the Salerno family, who helped us discover what “emergency obstetrics” means. replacement invoice for even the most frequent, healthy births. In case you missed any episodes, take the time to read and listen to each of our Bill of the Month episodes from this year – and help protect yourself from sticker shock.
We head into 2022 with a new federal law against unexpected medical bills, which goes into effect on January 1. far from a perfect law, which was in response to our Patient Bill of the Month conversation, Drew Calver, helped get started in 2018 when he wrote about the bill $109,000 He’s in debt after his heart attack, despite having insurance. We begin the fifth year of our community resource survey with more federals As a result, the law is introduced of the Bill of the Month feature – it would be great if a fix for an arbitrary “birthday rule” could leave new parents stuck in red tape that took less than four years to fix.
Click on the people below to hear their stories.
Bill of the Month is a community-resourced survey of KHN and NPR Dissect and interpret medical bills. Do you have an interesting medical bill you’d like to share with us? Tell us about it!
KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom specializing in the production of in-depth coverage of health issues. Along with Policy Analysis and Exploration, KHN is one of the three main activities in KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). The KFF is a nonprofit organization privileged to provide information on health issues to the nation.
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