People face a huge ripoff these days if they either have no health care insurance or if they have coverage with a provider that is out of town. When people seek treatment from a hospital, they are billed with “list prices” that the hospital claims that they can’t negotiate. But this isn’t true. The Department of Health and Human Services has directed all 4,800 hospitals in the United States to negotiate with patients on services. In the past, insurance companies have had different relationships with these hospitals. One insurer may have negotiated a deal with that hospital and, if you have that insurer, you are billed at 80 percent. Another person walks in with insurance that the hospital doesn’t recognize, and that person is billed at 100 percent. But now, that has all changed. If you’re in an MSA (Medical Savings Account) or you have no insurance at all, you can negotiate with that hospital. So how do you negotiate? You tell them you want to work out a payment plan based on the “medicare rate.” That is the target you are shooting for. Hospitals are bureaucratic organizations and they will try to bill you as much as they can. But you can work this in your favor.

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The main goal of a hospital is to make you well, right? But some hospitals have had serious problems and subsequently tragic consequences because the wrong medicine is administered to patients. There are so many people involved with the dispensation of prescriptions that there is huge room for error. As a result, the Department of Health and Human Services has issued a directive, requiring hospitals to use a bar code system for prescriptions. The doctor will write his or her prescription electronically, generating a bar code for each bottle. The bar code will match up with the patient, so the chances of the prescription harming someone are much lower. About 7,000 people die each year because they are given the wrong drugs. Let’s hope this helps. In addition, if you have elderly parents who take a lot of medications, you should monitor the medications they take.