Private equity firms have shelled out almost $1 trillion to acquire nearly 8,000 health care businesses, in deals almost always hidden from federal regulators. The result: higher prices, lawsuits, and complaints about care.
Knoxville’s Black Community Endured Deeply Rooted Racism. Now There Is Medical Debt.
Despite the end of Jim Crow segregation, its legacy lives on in medical debt that disproportionately burdens Black communities.
$38,398 for a Single Shot of a Very Old Cancer Drug
Lupron, a drug patented half a century ago, treats advanced prostate cancer. It’s sold to physicians for $260 in the U.K. and administered at no charge. Why are U.S. hospitals — which may pay nearly as little for the drug — charging so much more to administer it?
A Billing Expert Saved Big After Finding an Incorrect Charge in Her Husband’s ER Bill
A medical billing specialist investigated her husband’s ER bill. Her sleuthing took over a year but knocked thousands of dollars off the hospital’s charges — and provides a playbook for other consumers.
Kids’ Mental Health Care Leaves Parents in Debt and in the Shadows
A youth mental health crisis and a shortage of therapists and other care providers who take insurance are pushing many families into financial ruin. But it’s rarely acknowledged as medical debt.
Baby, That Bill Is High: Private Equity ‘Gambit’ Squeezes Excessive ER Charges From Routine Births
Hospitals, boosted by private equity-backed staffing companies, have embraced a new idea: the obstetrics emergency department. Often, it is just a triage room in the labor-and-delivery area, but it bills like the main emergency department.
Medical Debt Sunk Her Credit. New Changes From the Credit Reporting Agencies Won’t Help.
New policies to prevent unpaid medical bills from harming people’s credit scores are on the way. But the concessions made by top credit reporting companies may fall short for those with the largest debt — especially Black Americans in the South.
Listen: Medical Bills Upended Her Life and Her Credit Score
Penny Wingard, 58, of Charlotte, North Carolina, worries she won’t ever get out from under her medical debt despite new policies that are supposed to prevent medical debt from harming people’s credit scores.
Listen: Grieving Families Face the Cruelest Bills
KHN Midwest correspondent Lauren Weber talks with NPR’s “Consider This” podcast about her reporting on families confronted with medical bills while grieving the loss of a baby who received expensive hospital care.
Watch: Their Baby Died. The Medical Bills Haunted Them.
Sterling Raspe lived just eight months. In this KHN video, her father shows the 2-inch stack of medical bills generated by Sterling’s care.
Turned Away From Urgent Care — And Toward a Big ER Bill
Russell Cook was expecting a quick and inexpensive visit to an urgent care center for his daughter, Frankie, after she had a car wreck. Instead, they were advised to go to an emergency room and got a much larger bill.
$2,700 Ambulance Bill Pulled Back From Collections
After reporting from KHN, NPR, and CBS News, a patient’s $2,700 ambulance bill was pulled back from collections.
Britain’s Hard Lessons From Handing Elder Care Over to Private Equity
Four Seasons Health Care collapsed after years of private equity investors rolling in one after another to buy its business, sell its real estate, and at times wrest multimillion-dollar profits from it through complex debt schemes. The deal-making failed to account for the true cost of senior care.
Death Is Anything but a Dying Business as Private Equity Cashes In
Investors are banking on increased demand in death care services as 73 million baby boomers near the end of their lives.
Buy and Bust: After Platinum Health Took Control of Noble Sites, All Hospital Workers Were Fired
Two Missouri towns are without operating hospitals after private equity-backed Noble Health left both facilities mired in debt, lawsuits, and federal investigations. The hospitals’ new operator, Platinum Health, agreed to buy them in April for $2 and laid off the last employees in early September.
Private Equity Sees the Billions in Eye Care as Firms Target High-Profit Procedures
As private equity groups are swarming into aging America’s eye care, the consolidation is costing the U.S. health care system and patients more money.
The $18,000 Breast Biopsy: When Having Insurance Costs You a Bundle
An online calculator told a young woman that a procedure to rule out cancer would cost an uninsured person about $1,400. Instead, the hospital initially charged almost $18,000 and, with her high-deductible health insurance, she owed more than $5,000.
Haunted for 13 Years by Debt From Childbirth, Then Rescued by a Nonprofit
Terri Logan, 42, Spartanburg, South Carolina Approximate Medical Debt: $1,400, now $0 Medical Issue: Premature childbirth What Happened: Two months ahead of her due date with her second daughter, Terri Logan felt weighed down by stress. She was a high school math teacher in Union City, Georgia, and was ending her relationship with the baby’s […]
Sleepless Nights Over Her Children’s Future as Debts Pile Up
Jeni Rae Peters, 44, Rapid City, South Dakota Approximate Medical Debt: More than $30,000 Medical Issue: Breast cancer What Happened: Jeni Rae Peters’ budget has always been tight. But Peters, a single mom and mental health counselor, has worked to provide opportunities for her children, including two girls she adopted and a succession of foster […]
Her Brother Landed in a Nursing Home. She Was Sued Over His Bill.
Lucille Brooks, 74, Pittsford, New York Approximate Medical Debt: $8,000 Medical Issue: None. She was billed for her brother’s care. What Happened: Lucille Brooks was stunned to discover a nursing home in Monroe County, New York, was suing her. She had never been a patient there. Nor had her husband. “I thought this was crazy,” […]
