JabberJuls

BEWARE —hospital staff, doctors, billing services or membership services don’t have to discuss your spouses information on health or billing or anything, unless a Form is signed 1st. I thought that as long as you’re a spouse in California, you can attain this information. Being married you share community property, community financial responsibilities, etc. Not to the Medical Community. People have screwed with our rights so much… that the rights of big companies are protected and our married legal freedoms are being stripped from us. What’s going on? They want you to pay for your spouse, but not know that they’re double billing and overcharging. Most people just pay the bills instead of standing up for what’s right and wrong!

Be sure to have a Medical Power Attorney or a Statement of Authorized Representation signed, in permanent medical files, and several copies of it with you when you’re treated at a hospital or even as simple as being cared for by a doctor. Make sure to designate the the loved one of your choice, including Spouse if that’s your choice, on a Medical Health Care Directive or Medical Power of Attorney. If you don’t, the hospital and/or doctor is in control of what happens to you and your loved one can’t do anything about it. You can’t discuss billings, payments, inaccuracies, or fight for your spouse to receive care when it’s being overlooked during doctor visits or hospital stays.

Another thing to remember is that only a few doctors truly care about your whole health. If you get one of those–treasure them!!!

Unfortunately, Most doctors just treat temporary symptoms and don’t look at the big picture, especially when you’re under 50. Don’t you know you’re too young to have real heart problems, stomach problems, cancer, if you’re a woman no way could you be entering pre-menopause either, etc. Just because every part of your body is swollen, your heart is pounding or fluttering in your chest, your blood pressure is high, your leg or arms are numb for no reason, or you’re gaining weight at an unusaully high rate…there’s nothing wrong with you. I love it most when a test like sigmoidoscopy is ordered and they don’t complete the test because its too painful and there is scar tissue in the way….yet you are just fine. what? Does that sound fine to you?

I’m discovering that a lot of doctors are quick to label you. For seniors, the doctors are too quick to label them terminal or only require comfort care. If that happens, the nurses purposefully forget bathing the patient or taking care of them at all…why not?…They’re terminal anyway. What kind of thinking is that? The next thing you know, the patient has pneumonia and is near death or dies within a short period of time.

Here’s a simple issue that I’m facing just now that’s going crazily out of control as we speak.

Get this…my HMO (Kaiser) has been working with me on some billing issues for our family’s deductible based account since March 2007. Each month after March, I’ve contacted membership services which directed me to a specific department to deal with billing issues. It seemed like they were investigating my concerns and trying to work with me at first, but each month a new bill accrued and my payments weren’t posted correctly, etc. I made several calls to Membership services requesting assistance with the bills, requested someone to sit down with me and go over my receipts with their billings, but that request was only notated and wrong information was still compiling.

I finally put my request in writing on the kp.org patient log-in website area, because they refused to give me a mailing address to Membership Services or even a local location I could go into to speak to someone. I finally got notices that Kaiser received my requests and even an email on Kaiser’s own patient email system telling me they received my requests, with a note to expect several months for bills to be calculated. Still their billing information didn’t add up as I received it.

Finally on Dec. 18, 2007, a woman from the Higher Deductible Audit department called me and we spent over 5 hours discussing each bill and my receipts from February on. We came to an agreement of the balance owed and I paid the bill over the phone with my credit card. Everything settled and account was good.

Wrong….March 2008, I get collection agency notices that included the bills I paid off on Dec. 18, 2007. What’s wrong with this picture? So I addressed the collection agency in writing with both Russ & I’s signatures about the dispute of charges, who I talked to and paid that bill with, etc. I re-contacted Kaiser about the problem and the Representative found the error that Kaiser didn’t apply my payment correctly and disregarded notations on my account. She had to talk to her supervisor before it could be fixed and then she’d let me know. Haven’t heard back from her yet.

Yesterday, I received a notice in the mail from Kaiser, requesting my husband to sign a form of authorization to talk to me about the billing problem. Anything to delay taking care of this problem. Worst thing is now…I called the person from the letter requesting this form and asked why this form is being requested after going back and forth for over a year on this issue and all they could say is I have no record of your calls, written requests, etc. What? My written request is still in my kaiser email messages with a receipt of receiving my notice. Kaiser isn’t too organized I take it.

We’ll see what happens next. I guess most people would just pay the sticking bill and forget about it, but I can’t get myself to pay for something that I’ve already paid for. I’d rather go do something else with that money.

How about you? Have you faced crazy situations like this one? Share it with me.