Additional News for Medicare’s New Hospital Policy

Yesterday, we posted about Medicare’s implementation of its new policy in which it will not pay hospitals for any costs that are related to patients being injured due to medical errors while they are in a hospital’s care.

According to this article on NEWSInferno.com, Medicare posts a list of mistakes that it will not pay for on its website. Medicare will not pay for mistakes that include when patients

• Receive incompatible blood transfusions
• develop infections after certain surgeries
• must undergo a second operation to retrieve a sponge left behind from a first surgery
• experience serious bedsores, injuries from falls, and urinary tract infections caused by catheters

It is estimated that this policy will affect several hundred thousand hospital stays out of the 125 million people covered annually by Medicare.

“Billing balance” stirs up controversy

Business Week recently collaborated with the CBS Evening News educate the nation on the nature of “billing balance.” When an insurance company covers less of the medical payments than doctors want them to, they turn to the customer for the rest of the payment. Since patients think that their unpaid bills will turn their credit bad, many automatically pay the bills. This has resulted in patients paying $1 billion more a year in medical bills than they’re supposed to. The California Association believes that 1.76 million policy holders paid $5.28 million more than they were suppose to, including 56% of those who were billed