Health Insurance Isn't My Favorite Topic, Part 2

Here was Part 1...

It is worth watching at least the first two of the three videos from CNN, which my mom found:

The High Cost of Healthcare Video

If you watch at least the first and second videos you will understand why the hospital/ambulance bills have come to something beyond ridiculous for Jared having fainted twice for known and non-medical reasons.

The insurance settled some of the bills, but they decided that Jared's October hospitalization was not medically necessary.  We also agreed that it wasn't medically necessary, and the doctor Jared went to see after he was released also agreed, as did the ER doctor.   See, the doctor at the ER who told Jared he HAD to be admitted overnight also said he thought that Jared had fainted because of stress combined with not having eaten lunch (oops!).  Which at that point was *duh* to everyone present... But the doctor said Jared should stay on the extremely small off-chance that Jared had some undetected heart condition and would die of a heart attack when he went home.  This was, of course, after having having run every possible test known to medical science, and telling us that Jared was very healthy and fit, and didn't appear to have any underlying health problems... So how do you argue with the financial conglomerate which decided it was tired of paying for medical interventions that Jared didn't actually need?

Anyway, we haven't received the final bill from the hospital, but after various phone calls, I anticipate they will not bill us the amount they billed the insurance company, for which we will be very thankful, and I think we now have some recourse for covering the bill if it's higher than anticipated.

***

On a side note, we put in my birth plan a note for the staff (...at the very same hospital, mind you...) that if Jared feels stressed and faints during the birth, HE DOES NOT NEED TO GO TO THE ER.  That is one reason we are finding a doula.  Because she can send Jared out for some fresh air if she senses things are getting too intense for him.

But I think he'll be fine.  He was the one who calmly drove me to the emergency clinic on the Friday a year and a half ago when I was sicker and in more pain than I've ever experienced in my life.  Jared did not freak out, but very politely argued the VERY unhelpful doctor there into giving me the anti-nausea and pain-killing injections my regular doctor wanted me to get (since it was after hours) and prevented this same man from attempting to take my blood yet again (since I had already passed out once that day from attempts at having my blood drawn, and thereafter had not been able to keep any fluids down for longer than, say, five minutes... and the chances of this doctor or anyone else even being able to find a vein which still contained blood at that point was about nilch...)

...So what that means is I think Jared and I are going to be able to handle an attempt at natural birth just fine.  I'm sure it will be painful.  But we'll also know it's a natural process and I'm not actually dying.