Need surgery? Good luck getting hospital cost info

[Myrina]

4. I got a decent estimate on dr fees ...

... for my tubal/ablation last year, but when I tried to find out what the 'other fees' were going to be, my insurance company said 'the hospital can charge whatever they want' & calling the facility got me nowhere. Well, gee that was helpful.

So based on my ill-conceived idea that it was a quick procedure and the dr estimate was only a few hundred dollars, so additional costs might not be too bad, I went ahead with it.

I was in out-patient surgery and recovery for 3.5 hours from walk-in to wheel-out, and the hospital charged $12,000!!!!

My insurance at the time had a $3,000 deductible + 20% copay so I was on the hook for close to $5k.


Holy fuck.