this post was submitted on 04 Feb 2026
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[–] Hayduke@lemmy.world 117 points 1 day ago (1 children)

His prognosis is positive and he is grateful for the excellent care he is receiving.

How absolutely splendid for him. Pretty neat to be covered by quality healthcare at the expense of the taxpayers, I should imagine. Even better to be wealthy enough to go beyond even that.

Meanwhile I am still fighting my insurance to cover a $1k blood draw that is absolutely covered by my shit coverage. Fuck him. Fuck the insurance companies and fuck the elected officials that consistently battle the American people at the behest of their financiers.

[–] Kirp123@lemmy.world 38 points 1 day ago (6 children)

The fuck it costs 1000 dollars to get some blood drawn? What the fuck is happening in America.

[–] Hayduke@lemmy.world 5 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

It was a lot of tests, to be fair, and the funny thing is that it wasn’t all of it. There was another $130 charge for some other tests that they did end up covering - but not without appealing. It wasn’t a standard full panel blood test that I had to get at my age (48) due to family history. But regardless, my Dr ordered it and it’s goddamned covered.

[–] Kirp123@lemmy.world 3 points 12 hours ago

I just had my annual exam where they did a full blood panel, an EKG, urine panel and it didn't cost me anything.

[–] WizardofFrobozz@lemmy.ca 9 points 19 hours ago

The USA is a dozen people standing in a fully stocked supermarket with one guy saying, “I guess there’s nothing left- we’ll have to kill and eat each other,” while the other 11 quietly grumble about it but don’t dare do anything that might appear threatening. Someone will be along to save them, surely.

[–] CorrectAlias@piefed.blahaj.zone 27 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) (4 children)

I went to the urgent care (and was unfortunately referred to emergency care in the same building) for some chest pain a few weeks ago. Here's some of my bill (luckily most should be covered by insurance, we'll see if they give me trouble)

  • Blood draw/lab test: $446.63
  • Plasma test: $158.07
  • Chest x-ray: $664.66
  • "Emergency services" or in other words, the bill for getting transfered from urgent care to emergency: $3,987.00
  • ECG: $1,024.94

All of that, just for them to tell me that I was fine and to just rest. $6,295.29 for an hour long visit. If I didn't have insurance, I wouldn't be able to afford that and would have just preferred whatever was going to happen to me.

Meanwhile the fucking shitty human beings in Congress get free universal healthcare.

[–] AllHailTheSheep@sh.itjust.works 10 points 23 hours ago

I was in an accident a few years back and broke my orbital floor, sphenoid, and ended up with pneumocephalus. I was there for about 32 hours total and ended up with a 150k bill. 65k of that was imaging.

this country is so fucking broken. imagine even being able to go to the hospital for "flu like symptoms", most of us would never do that cause we know it'd be a 10k bill.

[–] BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk 4 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

What in the everloving fuck. I had some kinda specific symptoms one weekend, I called the doc on Monday, he said come in this afternoon (must've been a bit worried, getting an appointment normally takes longer, I don't want to misrepresent this).

I went in, we had a chat, he said come back tomorrow for a blood test. I dutifully went in for the test and went home. 8PM that night I got a call from an out of hours doctor, they said get yourself to A&E (emergency room). More bloods taken, I was triaged and admitted (which took about 36hrs - was a heavy time, I wasn't super urgent).

Spent the next 5 weeks in hospital, I now have a life long condition which necessitates a lot of pills that I've been taking for a few years now.

Total out of pocket cost £0.

People still try to claim the US system is superior.

[–] thefool@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 hours ago

That sucks, but it's good they discovered the cause right away.

I've had chest pain off and on for 20 years now, and I was super paranoid about it because all my relatives died of heart attacks on one side of the family, so I've been to the ER multiple times. Every time, they would admit me immediately, give me an aspirin and hook me to an ECG. One hour later, I leave because everything looks good.

Now when I get chest pain or tightness, I just roll my eyes, try to ignore it, and keep doing what I'm doing.

I finally decided to wear a Holter monitor and get a sonogram done, which revealed something unrelated. They said come back next year so we can look for changes.

Oh right, I've never had to worry about paying for anything. All I have to do is show my OHIP card when I walk in to the ER or the imaging clinic.

I did have to wait two weeks to get an appointment from my family doctor for that, followed by a day or two to get the Holter and sonogram, but that's Canadian health care for ya

[–] clif@lemmy.world 1 points 20 hours ago

I can tell you to rest for, I dunno, $500?

(Jokes aside, that's shitty and I've been there)

[–] Zombie@feddit.uk 4 points 17 hours ago

True Cost of US Healthcare Shocks the British Public:

https://youtu.be/Kll-yYQwmuM

[–] takeda@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

It is a scam pulled by insurance companies.

Let say there is a doctor that charges $100 for a visit. They come too then and say "we have large network, we can provide many patients for you, but we will pay 20% of your price".

The doctor still needs to get $100, because also needs to pay the staff and other expenses, so s/he raises their price to $500.

Now someone without insurance comes. The doctor doesn't need $500, and is ok charging just $100. But if s/he does the insurance might sure them that the doctor lied to them and they only supposed to pay $20. So they are forced to charge $500.

In summary, that $500 is never paid by anyone unless they don't have insurance.

You can check how much discount insurance pays by looking for "adjustment" column on your bill.

They purposefully use that name and posting the difference instead of price to obfuscate this.

What insurance is paying is the billed amount minus adjustment minus your copay and deductible.

There are other things contributing to high prices, but this is the biggest one IMO. If we didn't have insurance meddling with the prices, the prices would be much lower. Still high, but at least something someone could be able to pay.

The markups on labs are even more ridiculous, unless it is some highly specialized test they are actually cheap to the point that some insurances don't even require copays.

[–] WizardofFrobozz@lemmy.ca 1 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

It is a scam pulled by insurance companies

No, it’s cowardice on the part of the American people who refuse to throw a punch

[–] takeda@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 9 hours ago

It's hard to call it cowardice, when most people are not even aware of the scam.

[–] DrFistington@lemmy.world 1 points 22 hours ago

Yeah, I have labs I've been putting off for like 6 months because I know it's going to end up being like a $400-600 bill. They're just standard labs, CMP, CBC, lft