Victim of Snake Bite Gets Hospital Bill of $55,000

A Maryland woman treated for a snake bite received another shocker: a $55,000 medical bill. Jules Weiss had stopped to take a photo at an overlook along the George Washington Parkway. On the way back to her car, she felt something bite her.

"It felt just like a bee sting," Weiss told local station NBC4. "There were two fang marks with liquid coming out."

The former emergency medical technician had suffered a copperhead snake bite. Within an hour, she said, her foot turned “grayish” and started to swell. She went to Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, Md., where she received three IV bags of antivenom over 18 hours. Then, the scary part: a whopping $55,000 bill for treatment.

“It’s not a number I can really wrap my head around,” Weiss said. Health insurance would bring the cost down to a few hundred dollars, according to NBC4. But the woman’s insurance had just lapsed. Antivenom involves milking individual snakes and is a costly treatment.

The Bethesda Hospital told NBC4 it can cost as much as $40,000 to get the antivenom. That’s not the only pricey treatment for an animal attack: Last year, a woman in Arizona stung by a scorpion received a bill of $83,000 for the antivenom treatment — a staggering cost of $40,000 a dose. Even after insurance, Marcie Edmonds still owed the hospital $25,000.

When will right wingers learn that the current system is a scam of epic proporations ?!

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/snake-bite-victim-socked-with--55k-bill-150152873.html

 

This is an example of what I don't get about "Obamacare" insurance isn't the problem here, out of control prices are. Who the hell thinks it really costs even $5K for this antivenom?

 

And we've reached this state of dysfunction because there isn't a solid relationship between provider and consumer, making the pricing structure fantasy. Same happens in college tuition. The consumer needs to be paying the bills in order to hold the provider to a reasonable level of cost.

Also, let's shoot all the lawyers.

 

Its hilarious how the Right thinks the "free market" is ALWAYS such a good thing, even when it doesn't work!

Antivenom is expensive and dangerous to produce, it is rarely needed, and goes bad sitting around, so for every dose administered, many others are thrown away. IT is complicated to administer, and specialists on each end (manufacturer and hospital) spend considerable time reviewing the patient's circumstances and mpment to moment condition to see how much and when to give some and more.

Its a very expensive infrastructure to maintain, but even at these enormous prices, often there are shortages of antivenom because it is simply too expensive to maintain.

Te reality is that insurance is needed to pay the prices to save your life, and also the companies happily put all the zeros they want to on the bill when someone's life is on the line. Who is going to say no?

That is why national health care is far cheaper - raping dying people for massive profit is eliminated from the equation.

 

Being married to a lawyer myself, I dislike the idea of shooting all the lawyers.

Personally I believe that the money spent implementing "ObamaCare" would have been better spent putting a clinic in every WM SuperCenter in America (or wherever, WM is just an example) that was completely free to use if a person were uninsured.

Then making it a FELONY to use hospitals for anything other than life threatening situations where the clinic sent you to the hospital.

The clinics could operate at a lower cost than hospitals, because they would have FAR less overhead and hospitals would lower costs because they wouldn't be serving so many deadbeats.

 

You got any links to your "facts" about anti venom?

 

Did you have any links for your attitude about anti venom, and how it should cost $9.95 and be stocked at every little clinic around the country, available for a $80 office visit instead of requiring an ER and an ICU hospital admission??

 

The free market keeps the zeros off the bill.

 

You got any links to back up your lies about what I did and did not say?

 

It works fine, as long as idiot progressives dont declare hospitals as "Too Big To Fail".

Ya know obamacare makes it illegal to post prices for hospital services online, or in print?

and retards blame capitalism, when obama and pals make capitalsim illegal...

 

Two words...Charity Care!

 

Fiddlerdave, you're pretty close to right.

http://www.americanownews.com/story/19907160/antivenom-meds?clienttype=printable

Even dog antivenin costs $550 a vial. http://www.allivet.com/p-2673-antivenin-10ml-vial.aspx

 

Who pays for that clinic?

 

Um the same people who paid for "Obamacare" would have been cheaper.

 

Prices are based on how badly you need the product or procedure. IF you are really sick the price is very high but if you just feel bad and will get better on your own in a few days the price isn't that high.

The price of anti-venom is based on supply and demand just like the price of sex is. Cancer medications are the same way. There is plenty of it because people who need it are willing to pay all they have to get it so the companies charge outrageous prices. Some of the medications have a lot of research and development to pay back but every patient shouldn't have to pay the whole price for the development of the drug that they need.

 

So what you are saying is a clinic program for free healthcare for minor things like flu shots, simple injuries, common office visit stuff?

 

And the Obama-hater false propaganda NEVER STOPS!

Obamacare CLEARLY REQUIRES the publication of price lists for medical procedures, and in fact it appears all the Obama-haters slept through the first publication of the actual charges paid to hospitals and doctors for Medicare procedures, information recently released by the Obama administration and was reported widely!!

http://cynics4bettertomorrow.org/wordpress/?p=538

 

Understood, but I think a lot of the time, hospitals just make up the fees as they go along. A few years ago my grandfather went to the hospital for 2 weeks , well he ended up passing away and I was the one who did all his final expenses and such and some of the fees were just crazy. He had to be helicoptered from our local hospital to a larger facility for example and the fee was $88K . For a 60 mile trip, one way. Come on now. I actually out of curiosity called a charter company and learned that I could have chartered an identical helicopter for $5K.

That $88K ONLY covered the helicopter, it didn't include any of the medical care or supplies used during the flight.

Of course Medicare covered it, so I guess that's no big deal eh?

That's the kind of thing I'm talking about . Noway the hospital needs to be charging outrageous prices like that.

 

Uhh, if you are paying for sex, you might be also paying for some health care a few weeks later.

 

We don't need a healthcare system to enable us to pay the ridiculous medical prices, we need a set of laws passed which drastically limit the cost of medical.
And you're right about the lawyers, though you know what? If the judges were good, they'd send frivolous cases out of their court saying, "Counselor, if I see you again with a case like this, I'll recommend you be disbarred." I think it's the judges that are the problem, because they PUT UP with the lawyers.

Like the politicians who allow things to be such that the rich can control things. If the politicians would rearrange things and stop taking 'payoffs', the rich would have no political power.

 

your claim is so wide spread the only source you can find is from a kook blog? Get real.

Lets look at some facts....



UPDATED! Oklahoma City Hospital Posts Surgery Prices Online, Creates Bidding War, Prices Drop

Oklahoma City hospital posts surgery prices online; creates bidding war

OKLAHOMA CITY – An Oklahoma City surgery center is offering a new kind of price transparency, posting guaranteed all-inclusive surgery prices online. The move is revolutionizing medical billing in Oklahoma and around the world.

Dr. Keith Smith and Dr. Steven Lantier launched Surgery Center of Oklahoma 15 years ago, founded on the simple principle of price honesty.

“What we’ve discovered is health care really doesn’t cost that much,” Dr. Smith said. “What people are being charged for is another matter altogether.”

Surgery Center of Oklahoma started posting their prices online about four years ago.

Click here to see the online prices at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.

The prices are all-inclusive quotes and they are guaranteed.

“When we first started we thought we were about half the price of the hospitals,” Dr. Lantier remembers. “Then we found out we’re less than half price. Then we find out we’re a sixth to an eighth of what their prices are. I can’t believe the average person can afford health care at these prices.”

Their goal was to start a price war and they did.

Their first out-of-town patients came from Canada; soon everyday Americans caught on.

Matthew Gang, 22, tore his patella tendon, dislocating his knee-cap playing basketball earlier this year.

Gang is from California and he is uninsured.

Surgery in his home-state was going to be about $30,000.

The posted price at Surgery Center of Oklahoma was $5,700, one-fifth the price.

Matthew and his father Tom Gang flew from California to Oklahoma for surgery.

“It was well worth it,” Tom Gang said. “I need a rotator cuff surgery right now. I’m thinking about flying out there and having my surgery because it was such a positive experience for us.”

A handful of other Oklahoma medical facilities have started joining Surgery Center of Oklahoma in price transparency:

McBride Orthopedic Hospital
Oklahoma Heart Hospital
Cancer Specialists of Oklahoma
Breast Imaging of Oklahoma
Comprehensive Diagnostic Imaging

Surgery Center of Oklahoma does accept private insurance, but the center does not accept Medicaid or Medicare.

Dr. Smith said federal Medicare regulation would not allow for their online price menu.

They have avoided government regulation and control in that area by choosing not to accept Medicaid or Medicare payments.

Several medical facilities in Oklahoma are posting their prices online through The Kempton Group’s website, in order to circumvent that Medicare guideline.

The Kempton Group is a third-party administrator for self-funded health insurance plans in Oklahoma and Texas.

Click here for a list of Oklahoma facilities which offer online pricing through The Kempton Group.

“The key to this is really about empowering employees.” Kempton Group President and CEO J. Wayne Kempton said.

Some Hospital administrators accuse the surgery center of cherry-picking the healthiest and wealthiest patients.

Oklahoma Hospital Association President, Craig Jones, supports transparency in theory.

Jones calls the issue “complicated” and does not expect major metro hospitals to offer online price menus in the future.

“Where we can reveal information that’s meaningful to the patient, we very much support that; that’s what hospitals need to do,” Jones said. “The difficulty when you compare hospitals with surgery centers is that surgery centers, most of the work they do are elective procedures which are a bit more predictable.”

The difference in price is staggering.

News Channel 4′s Ali Meyer obtained bills from the metro’s three largest medical centers: Mercy Medical Center, Integris Baptist Medical Center and OU Medical Center.

Mercy Hospital charged $16, 244 for a breast biopsy; the procedure will cost $3,500 at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.
OU Medical Center billed $20,456 for the open repair of a fracture; the procedure will cost $4,855 at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.
OU Medical Center billed $21,556 for a gall bladder removal surgery; the procedure will cost $5,865 at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.
OU Medical Center billed $23,934 for an ankle arthroscopy; the procedure will cost $3,740 at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.
Integris Baptist billed $37,174 for a hysterectomy; the surgery costs $8,000 at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.

“I think there’s a tendency to over-simplify the issue of price transparency but there’s no doubt that hospitals are and need to be more accountable to the public,” Jones said. “To try to make the services and the businesses that they carry out more understandable.”

According to the hospital association, about half of Oklahoma’s hospitals are losing money.

However, the metro’s largest hospitals, which are building free-standing emergency rooms and satellite facilities, are not on that list.

“The ‘haves’ seem to be doing a little bit better and the ‘have-nots’ seem to be doing a little bit worse,” Jones said.

However prices may be dropping because of the transparency at Surgery Center of Oklahoma.

As patients are demanding price-matching, some hospitals relent.

“Hospitals are having to match our prices because patients are printing their prices and holding that in one hand and holding a ticket to Oklahoma City in the other hand and asking that hospital to step up,” Dr. Smith said. “So we’re actually causing a deflationary effect on pricing all over the United States.”

The economics are not simple.

But for patients who are finding ways to save on medical care, that seems to be all that matters.

Integris Baptist responded to this story with the following statement:

It is difficult to compare two bills, even for the same procedure, without taking into account a person’s general health, age, weight, medical history, lifestyle, blood type, religious preferences, pre-existing conditions both known and unknown and possible complications; all of which contribute to the final charge.

Instead of offering a generic price list for medical procedures we work individually with patients to determine their financial responsibility. Through our Consumer Price Line patients can obtain charge information in advance on a variety of procedures and services offered at any INTEGRIS Health facility throughout the state of Oklahoma. This is done on a case-by-case basis taking into account insurance payments and self-pay discounts. Financial counselors are also available to help patients who may need to make payment arrangements or obtain other financial assistance to meet their obligations.

The INTEGRIS Price Line phone number is available to consumers from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday at 405-713-4500 or toll Free 877-313-4500.

 

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/20120920arizona-hospital-cuts-scorpion-antivenom-price-80-percent.html?nclick_check=1

Arizona hospital cuts scorpion antivenom price by 80%

.....Chandler Regional Medical Center billed an Ahwatukee Foothills woman $83,046 for a June visit that included administering two doses of scorpion antivenom. The Chandler hospital's charge for the scorpion antivenom? $39,652 per dose.

After The Arizona Republic reported the charges, the hospital said it would review its pricing for the drug. Arizona Department of Health Services records show the hospital has lowered its price to $8,000 per dose of Anascorp, a discount of $31,652, or 80 percent, per dose from its previous charge.

Other hospitals' charges range from $7,950 per dose at Banner Health to $21,875 per dose at Phoenix Children's Hospital, according to Department of Health Services records

Mexico-based Instituto Bioclon produces more than 250,000 vials of the scorpion antivenom each year for Mexican residents. The Mexican version of the drug is sold for about $100 per vial at pharmacies or for less at government-funded clinics and hospitals in Mexico.

 

so , just about 200 miles away a person can literally buy the same exact drug for pennies on the hundred dollar, yet we're supposed to believe that some of these costs are justified??

 

gigantic rip off. Its collusion of the industry. Funny how an insurance company has no problem playing ridiculous bills, isn't it?

Market forces makes a lot of sense when it comes to medical treatment doesn't it? they gotcha by the balls when if comes to your life.

 

So basically, the moral of the story is to go to mexico for health care