I should get a fucking discount

And with the arrival of the bigots, we can no longer have nice things. We did the thing. See post flair, report rule breaking and so on and so forth.

And it only gets worse every year. My 20 week anatomy scan for my first pregnancy was covered 100%. My second pregnancy five years later? $900 out of pocket! When I called and asked why it wasn’t covered they said “oh it is”. On what planet is $900 for routine pregnancy care coverage? Same hospital, exact same insurance. Fucking unreal.

I work for an insurance company. You’d think we’d get awesome insurance working for the source. Nope. The company said they wanted us to relate better to our customers. So they gave us low tier / expensive af everything.

There’s a hospital near me where a set of twins in the nicu have both been diagnosed with SMA. They were born 3/31. Their insurance decided to stop covering a 2 million dollar one-time treatment that can drastically reduce the effects of SMA on 4/1. Insurance is refusing to retroactively cover the treatment. The mom is a nurse at the hospital… and the hospital refuses to give her babies the treatment.

It’s so messed up.

You are falling into the narrative health care insurance CEO’s want you to fall into.

Instead of pointing out the “Joe shmoe” who is likely less fortunate than we are, let’s direct our anger at insurance companies and the people making huge profits off of you.

In 2022, health insurance CEOs earned substantial compensation, with some of the highest payouts reported for industry leaders. For example, Joseph Zubretsky of Molina Healthcare topped the list with a total compensation of $22.13 million, including a base salary, stock options, and non-equity incentive pay. Similarly, Karen Lynch of CVS Health earned $21.32 million, while David Cordani of Cigna received about $20.97 million. Other notable CEOs like Gail Boudreaux of Elevance Health and Andrew Witty of UnitedHealth Group had compensations around $20.93 million and $20.87 million, respectively. THIS IS FOR ONE SINGLE YEAR.

We have to stick together.

As someone who lives outside of the USA, I’m always surprised to hear this. These problems simply do not exist in my country. At all. Our system has its own problems, but nobody pays out of pocket for services like this. There are no copays and there is no such thing as an “out of network” provider. These things only exist in America for the rich to get richer. It serves no other purpose.

Working in the medical field in the USA has really swayed me to believe in social healthcare. Especially getting what counts as health insurance from a healthcare company 🙄

My friend Katie married a Japanese man. They are living in Japan and under the Japan socialized healthcare.

They are responsible for 30% of their own care, excluding wellness, prenatal and neonatal care.

She was not feeling well and went to a GP for care. The GP encouraged her to get a pap and breast exam while she was there. The GP found a lump and told her she will need a mammogram. Katie asked how to schedule it, the GP said that the office nurse would walk her down to another floor for the mammogram now.

The mammogram was performed by a tech, a doctor came in immediately and gave her the results. She suspected Cancer. They did a biopsy that day, confirmed cancer. ALL of this was done in one day. Her out of pocket cost was $75 USD.

The receptionist helped her schedule her treatment and two days later she had a mastectomy. Shortly after that she was going for some chemotherapy, which she was provided a nice shuttle to take her to and from the infusion center. Her copay for the mastectomy was $125 USD, her copay for the infusions were $3 USD.

Katie's experience was NOT uncommon.

But in the USA the insurance companies spend time and effort on anti-socialized healthcare propaganda. Many people will claim they have a relative that died waiting 18 months to see a doctor for their heart. 🙄

To see my doctor it’s €50 (No insurance - European) and he asked me what I do so I answered honestly. When I went up to the receptionist to pay he came up behind me and told the receptionist to give me the colleague discount! I only paid €20!!

Healthcare should be free for HCW.

I complain that it’s still snowing where I live, but I’m so thankful to live in Canada where healthcare is free. I honestly couldn’t imagine getting a bill for things like X-rays and hospital stays

This is why all nurses need unions. In NY union, we pay $25pp/max $100 for a family with dependents for no deductible, low copay PPO. It’s a really damn good insurance and you can see any doctor you choose. In case anyone is curious: https://www.rnbenefits.org/Benefits-Fund/My-Benefits/Medical

I had pharmacy remove my insurance on file and bill as uninsured using goodRX & Hippo codes…. About HALF PRICE!!!! grrrrr

Instead of getting mad at people who are on Medicaid be mad at the insurance companies and our government.

Went to the ER, same system I work for. SAME system. Went for pilonidal cyst eval (which turned out to be nothing).

One set of vitals.

Out of pocket expense almost $1100. Copay of $250 and then the rest insurance didn’t cover. They also billed insurance $3500

Fucking lunacy

Had a random dental abscess. I went to the dentist today, $3,600 for a root canal. Oh but it’s covered by insurance so it’s only going to cost me $2,100! 😑 insurance is a scam.

Honestly same. $40 pcp copays. $75 urgent care visit. I remember for the same insurance I used to pay $20, $25!

The problem isn’t the pricing, the problem is that there is a price.

I'm dealing with the same thing for a stupid US of my RLE for suspected DVT during my third trimester.  I hate hate HATE this system and I hate insurance.  All they do is take my money and have all these convoluted rules nobody can understand, which is by design!!!  They can r*pe your wallet the more they confuse you!

My husband is a retired truck driver. For his first few years he drove for Watkins Motor Lines when John Watkins Sr still ran it. Top of the line Aetna family coverage, covered 90% of everything including well child. Then he went union with the teamsters. Pretty darn good medical mutual coverage for zero premiums, he and I still have that coverage under retiree benefits for a hundred a month until Medicare eligible. We always said it was a damn shame the truck driver had better benefits available than the nurse.

The retiree benefits don’t extend to dependent children, so when he retired I had to take out employee + one to cover the youngest. I get the absolute cheapest crappiest medical so he has something, and buy up on the vision and dental as it’s only a few bucks difference. The fact I’m paying for insurance I never use and rarely use for the kid annoys me to no end.

EVERYBODY deserves healthcare. “Joe Schmo who hasn’t worked a day in his life” (and I would urge you to challenge that narrative) and you both deserve universal healthcare

Almost like universal healthcare is the better option

Health insurance is a racket. It's all a racket. Trust me, Joe Schmoe is not the enemy.

You know what, I agree. Just like I think people that work for a hospital should not have to pay for parking at their place of work!

This is the upside to living in Canada, to be honest. We don’t have to worry about this. My extended health benefits cover dental for my family pretty much 100%, most drugs (though the province pays for kids drugs), we have unlimited mental health coverage for the whole family, also.

Currently drowning in medical debt after a high risk pregnancy and we don’t have an MFM in network🫠

My mom is a nurse and we didn’t have health insurance growing up bc her doctor office job didn’t offer it

So we’re all getting shitty insurance??

Yup! At my last hospital job I was paying $800/month for benefits. I didn’t even have a dental insurance that most dentists accept in my area so I still had to pay out of pocket to be with the dentist I’ve been with the last 20 years. It was absolutely insane.

Every time a provider gives me a list of obscure labs to order I feel like I’m an accomplice to financially destroying someone

Universal. Healthcare. Thats it. US healthcare is a scam and joke

I know I shouldn’t receive any special treatment but one night I cut my finger open deep and couldn’t stop the bleeding. I floated regularly to the ER at the hospital I worked at and I got an xray bill from the new ER doc who didn’t know me. One of the docs ended up talking to that guy and all of a sudden my xray bill went away. Imagine if I didn’t work in healthcare and didn’t know about itemized bills or calling the hospital to ask for a discount/payment plans/reduced bills etc

Technically Joe Shmoe is charged, they just don't pay and don't care about the crushing debt. You can also completely ignore the bill, but it will probably have some negative impact on your life. Joe is already at rock bottom.

But I hear you. Hospital insurance sucks. I even worked for the VA, the federal government! Everyone always talks about their great benefits... They are talking about the pension. The health insurance is not great. My SO is a city employee and has FANTASTIC health insurance. It's ridiculous.

Yep as someone with an unfortunate list of health issues rn my outta pockets are really adding up this year! My theory its so we have to pick up more shifts to afford our own medical care, because thats exactly what I have to do hahahahahahaaa 🥲

I JUST had a patient come in for DKA. They were waiting for a prior authorization to get their insulin pump script renewed. This is the medication that they had been on for YEARS. The patient called the provider, pharmacy, and insurance multiple times leading up to admission. The provider tried to send in insulin pens in the meantime but the insurance wouldn’t cover both so they denied the pens. So patient is waiting days and on Friday glucose was up to 800’s. So they come in, get admitted and all the things. Now the insurance company is going to have to pay for a hospital bill instead, along with the insulin pump script. WHY does it have to be this way. The patient could have died had they tried to continue waiting for the insurance company to take their time. I had to call the pharmacy before discharge to make sure we could them squared away with something before they left and pharmacist was distraught because she had been working on this particular script all of the last week. It’s just so freaking stupid.

You are right in wanting to see the system burn but don’t blame other patients instead we blame the greedy government and corporations! Universal healthcare should be for all ❤️

I’m a chronically ill person (Hashimoto’s, lupus, chronic migraines, tons of skin issues) and when I went through the long process of diagnosis, and beginning treatments, I literally quit my job to get free insurance. I went down to the department of human services, and told them my income was $0. So I got free insurance that paid for everything. Thankfully I had money saved from working 2 jobs 80-100 hours a week during covid. So for like 3 months, I ate ramen and didn’t have wifi. But I don’t have any medical bills from it. Pretty sad that’s what it resorted to

For. Fucking. Real.

Get this. I got kicked by an HIV+ pt with open sores on their legs. This person is a frequent flyer on state assistance with 12+ admissions in the past 12 months. My manager tells me to go to the ED to get checked out. I go. I fill out the employee health L&I form and think everything is good. I get a bill and I’m confused as fuck, so I fill out a state L&I claim. State denies it saying the company has their own form of L&I. I look and the bill is no longer on my record so I assume when they were contacted by the state they realized the forgot to file something…nope. The bill went to collections and I JUST found out about it.

During this same time I’m trying to get set up with a new PCP within the same healthcare system I work for. 9 months out. While I am waiting, I get a flare up from a new disease I didn’t know I had so I try to see of I can get in sooner. Nope. I have to go to the ED. Cool, fucking great.

I get a script that should help me out. Then I get the good ole prior auth run around from the insurance company. So now I have an ER bill from getting kicked by a patient that is in collections, I have to pay hundreds of dollars out of pocket for a med if I want relief, and I still can’t even get an appointment to see a PCP until December so if I have any complications between then I’ll just have to go back to urgent care or the ED.

This all happened within the span of a week. I fucking hate all of it. I wish getting a discount was part of our compensation package.

Eight years after my total colectomy. 6 surgeries or perpaps 8. Cataracts too. Wifes labrum repair and hysterectomy.

About $50,000 out of pocket in the last 8 years.

Insurance has paid out at least 600k in the past 8 years for my wife and I

Yup I pay 250$ per pay pre-tax for “platinum” level health coverage for myself and my 2 kids. It’s a lot but I have zero deductible. So no bill once I pay my copay. So it’s a trade off. And I have a chronic health condition that can flare up and crank up the hospital bills so I’m thankful at least I don’t get the crazy bills like I used too. I don’t know how people with lower grade health coverage possibly manage. Ugh!

I thought I had really great insurance until my son needed a chest xray and it was 500$ out of pocket!

LOL aint no way. I was just thinking about our frequent flyers in the ER and how nice it might be for them to check into one ED, not like their answer. Leave AMA and go the hospital next door. Not a single bill. And they get better meds than me

Back in the day, working at the hospital got you the good-good insurance - for free.

Thanks capitalists

💯 I work at UPS simply for the health insurance! Married+ 3 kids, our insurance premium through my husbands work was $1600+ month (2yrs ago) and the FN deductable was like $8k per/person, no dental, no vision, really only covered check ups, everything else would be covered after meeting the deductable... WTF! 🤬

I've had to file medical bankruptcy while my husband and I both worked as rns...and we both had insurance. it was bad insurance that would arbitrarily decide not to pay.

I feel you.

I've always said we should get free medical everything in the facility where we work. They take money out of our paychecks so it's not like they aren't getting anything. Or at the very least, a very hefty discount.

I can absolutely corroborate this.. (TLDR at the end)

Story time!! 1 year ago, I had just started a new job (more on this later, but just think insurance coverage timing)...

One condition of my starting was contingent on time off for an amazing opportunity to drive from Seattle to Anchorage with one of my best friends who I met as a fellow traveler. She took a contract in Anchorage for the summer but didn't want to make the 1,700+mi journey alone.

Aaanyway, my 34-year-old ass had wayyy too much fun at a Mariners game😅(this is what I get for pregaming with a bunch of 25yo's🙈)..then decided to take a Lime scooter back my best friend's bf's place which was less than 2 miles up the road (Uber surge charges were insane!!)

Ya'll... Without fail, I 💯 ate shit on the brick sidewalks of Old Town Seattle!! Though I made it pretty far for what it's worth...

Next thing I know I'm lying on the brick sidewalk, watching as my phone left my hand and slid halfway across Western Avenue, towards Pike Place Market.. No less than 50 feet... THEN looking down to see my favorite jeans doused in blood, and my knees scraped to shit 😭😭

It was a stoplight and several people watched this unfold. However No one got out to see if I was okay... But I limped my way over to get my phone, which the cars allowed me to do, even though they had a green light.

Yessss thank God, my Samsung Galaxy S21+... A modern engineering marvel... was a champ and survived this ordeal (it was quite wet and still sprinkling out).

I'll get to the point... I landed on my knees but my left Arm HURT ... Couldn't abduct more than 2 inches from my shoulder. Luckily no pain at rest though.. 5 days later we made it to Anchorage!!!

As a student pilot, I really wanted the opportunity to fly in Alaska. I heard flying there was second to none and something you must experience in the aviation world.

Finally made it back to Phoenix the next week, ROM was improving.

Now I was hired mid April. When you're hired on with a facility owned by Amsurg, unfortunately insurance doesn't start until the month FOLLOWING one complete month of work. In this case my insurance started June 1st. Saw PCP who ordered MRI. Claim DENIED... Go get an XR first...

Fine. XR was normal. Insurance then recommended TO MY PCP, injections and PT. They called to inform me of this and I said "what are we injecting if we don't even know what's wrong????"

Ended up paying the $400 cash for an MRI with my HSA card. Results revealed a full humerus Fx with bone marrow edema!!!

TL:DR- US healthcare workers receive quite literally the worse healthcare coverage of any field, and it's the most fucked up part of dedicating our lives to this field

Psych nurse here, I also do community visits . Baffles me what my low income patients get- in terms of healthcare- meanwhile I have chrons disease and can’t even get the proper medication. I’ll take patients to appts and they’ll have every test done on them and for no reason at all. Never worked a day in their life. Theyre just draining the system.

What gives.

I work at a SNF I decided not to opt in for the insurance they offer because I didn’t want to switch from Kaiser. I stayed on covered California, paying loads out of pocket, BUT, I get it all reimbursed by my MRA that my SNF has to pay into since I decided against their offered insurance 😋 my coworkers are paying like 300+ a month out of their check for mediocre coverage and I get great coverage for free

Yeah, I have a self insured employer and the "insurance" doesn't cover anything but lucky me, the employer puts a few bucks into our HSA accounts.

Traveling now so I have to pay for my own insurance and I just decided not to. I've done my own labs out of pocket once each year and I'm very fit otherwise with no need for meds or chronic illnesses.

Pay 500.00 monthly for insurance and recently had an ultrasound done it was 600.00 after what insurance covered.

I completely agree with everything you said! I mean I don't work in a hospital but you know what I'm saying. I'm a CNA out of long-term care skilled nursing facility and I'm trying to figure out still how my coworker who has Medicaid and has had a gastric sleeve surgery and she has had a few hospital stays over the past year over some other medical issues and she also got a whole brand new mattress and air filter and a HEPA vacuum cleaner for free last year which that was you know through the county but still I digress, because she was on Medicaid she qualified for whatever that program was because of her allergies. She gets allergy shots for her hives and she doesn't have to pay anything and you know you catch my drift. I'm trying to figure out how is it that she is covered by Medicare or Medicaid I should say when she is an employee at the same place I work which means she makes at least $30,000 a year, also she's married and her husband works full time so if they go by household income then how the hell is she eligible! I asked her once and she said I got it when I had my son and they just never took it away and who am I to say anything I said okay but your son is 21 years old! What the hell man?! And I'm pretty sure that you have to like re-qualify every year or something no? So unless she blatantly lies which she's told me she does not, do they not realize that okay you covered her when she was pregnant but that was 20 something years ago now? They may decide they they want all those years paid back to them

Wife got charged over $500 per hour of outpatient pelvic floor PT at the hospital we both work at. We are both OTs at this hospital, who claims it is nonprofit. We couldn’t afford that, so we were just out nearly $2000 with her issue still unresolved. The employee insurance provided by this same hospital didn’t cover any of it.

Ask for a cash price, you can usually get a foot xray cash for like $75 or less

One time I felt sick at work (onset of a migraine), was sent to the ED because when my coworkers took my vitals, my bp and hr were high (I was super anxious during the whole thing). I should’ve just declined to go but I was new RN and didn’t know how to go about the situation. I got an ED bed right away for being an employee, but first they brought me to the billing office to charge me $250 copay. I told them nevermind, went up to the unit to grab the rest of my stuff and went home. Then I called the next day to make sure I wasn’t charged with anything lol

There should be no difference between being a police officer, firefighter, park ranger, or medical professional. Its not like it was back in the 20's where someones house is on fire and we extort money to put it out. Or someone gets mugged and the police take a cut of what was in their wallet. Should be no different for healthcare. Things are fucked up, but I can put more good into the world at least being kind and helping heal people.

I work for home health. Our insurance is so shitty, our company doesn’t even accept patients with it. The deductible is ridiculous and even when you meet it, coverage is still ridiculous. Mpfl repair surgery 2 years ago? 21k. AFTER insurance. Google said if I had gone to mexico and had it done, cash price would have been $600.

I hate it as well. My neighbor calls 911 for an upset stomach and never pays a dime. I thought I broke my wrist and paid a 150$ deductible. It's insane.

I work in insurance so, when it comes to your insurance, your employer decides what they will cover. A lot of people usually gets made at the insurance (rightfully so, healthcare shouldn’t break the bank) but your employer decides what will they cover and how much. So, for private health insurance, please read your plan documents! They tell you so much :)

Submit a workmen’s comp claim

Five people with private insurance? That sucks. It should be zero. I wonder if those five people know that they're paying for both private and public insurance but only get to use the more expensive option.

Just hope you never have a. Inpatient admission. My son was in the nicu for weeks and it was fucking terrible. I was so ticked

I feel this on another level 🥲

lol I got a bill from my fire department cause I got transported in the ambulance by the same ambulance I was working on

Oh, the system *is* burning down.

I’m surprised to hear that, the hosp system I work for, if you have their insurance, X-rays and scans are free, in patient stays are free, surgeries (minus anesthesia) are free etc.

Only reason I'm still at my current job... And I'm stuck here because of the insurance. Free urgent care, not even a copay, when I use the one associated with the hospital. Can also get free labs and X-rays and MRIs. Free surgeries for me and my family, only on the hook for price of anesthesia (which was like $300 for my T&A and septoplasty) and a doctor fee which was like $35 or something. I'm never going to find better healthcare benefits.

We make too much bullshit. Lmao for real fk healthcare. I went to the ED for possible heart attack too now I owe them then bill comes up of course I try to beg them to lower it down or any discounts am I eligible for but sadly WE MAKE TOO MUCH LMAO. While we take care of people who needs and abuses the system. Hate it so much I grab all my cleaning supplies at work idgaf I'm grabbing what I can screw them all.

My daughter is leaving bedside nursing to become a school nurse. As a school employee she will have great medical/dental insurance, good pay, holiday/summers off, and a great state pension.

Just give a fake name, they can’t charge you then

The hospital I work for sent my bills to collections bc they don’t pay me enough to pay them 🫢

My premium doubled this year, despite nothing extra being covered. But premiums only doubled for employee + spouse, not anyone else.

I needed pre-op labs in January and I had to pay $400....to get drawn at the hospital where I work, and run in the lab where I also work. 🙃 And that was just basic routine labs.

I truly believe if we work for the healthcare system we should pay at least 50% or none of our basic medical expenses within reason, especially ER visits and PCP visits for yearly physicals.

I'm trying to not take this personally, but just because someone is "on the system" doesn't mean they have never worked or don't deserve to get the help that they need. I was a hardworking RN until I was diagnosed with cancer at 25 and could not work. I'm on medicaid (well now medicare) because I physically could not work. While I 100% agree that the system sucks and we should have universal Healthcare for this very reason, pulling people down under terrible stereotypes is just not the way.

I just paid 1500.00 co pay for an MRI 🥹 I’ve been a nurse about 14 years and that was still a major ouch. 😣

I work at an outpatient oncology clinic and employees gave access to imaging. Xrays are $10, CT $100, MRI $200. It’s def a nice perk when it’s needed.

This is why we’ve been arguing for Medicare for all for years. It’s the ethical thing to do

I do labor and delivery and have been feeling super salty about the same issues here lately. I’m in medical debt cause my child had an anaphylactic reaction to abx. I owe over 4,000 because of an ambulance ride and two day stay. Yet here I am caring for ladies on their 20th kid, no job, section 8, and it gets disheartening. It’s the state of healthcare now. The middle guy gets screwed hard. I wouldn’t even call myself middle class but low middle class maybe. I’m paycheck to paycheck.

Unpaid Hospital bills dont ruin credit 🤗

Most of us pay a lot to cover for those who can't afford it. The Americans still think that they are not in socialism.

Anyway, my insurance is excellent. I had a CT scan and was covered 100%. I paid ten US dollars for everything when I was hospitalized.