Truth or Dare:  Medical bills are easy to read and consistently accurate? I dare you to challenge your medical invoice amount!

Seriously. As part of MB’s goal to educate our clients and their employees to be the best health care consumers, we constantly look for articles to share on the subject. After reading how a mother delivered her second child during COVID, following doctor’s orders, went to the hospital for what concluded as a normal delivery… was imposed additional charges over the expected and agreed-upon payments. It is a perfect example of how imperative it is to check and double-check your EOB or invoice.

The minute you walk into an Emergency Room, the charges begin to tally. So, the questions you must ask yourself before you even consider the trip is, “Is this really an emergency?”

“Could I go to Urgent Care, my doctor’s office, or even connect with someone via TeleHealth?”

Carriers have established protocol that if your condition is not life-threatening, your claim may be denied.

Now back to our pregnant mother. Her doctor told her to come to the hospital because she was on call that night…(how rare is it that your doctor is the one on call when you go into labor?) Well, due to COVID, only one entry was available for the hospital. Yes, it was the ER entrance. She was checked in, and of course, it is a matter of bringing another life into the world, so it was coded as an emergency without question.

Mother and father weren’t in the ER for more than 10 minutes before walking themselves to Labor and Delivery to welcome their second son to the family.

Now granted, this was during an extraordinary and troubling time for health care…still is, for that matter.

Our lesson to take away from this is, as the article states, “Anything in our health system labeled as an emergency room service likely comes with a big additional charge.” Price transparency is two-sided, doctors should provide the cost expectations, and we as consumers and patients should check our invoice. As an MB client, if you ever need help with billing or your coverage, contact a member of your MB account team or the MB Advocates.