Help! $10,000 plus in Medical Bills, no Insurance!!?

Question

My husband and I had our son 4/11/2008, we are uninsured. We were denied the Oregon Health Plan (Medicaid) because we "make too much money!" PLEASE!W e are both working at fast food joints and making $10.50 and $12 respectively. Anyway, the point is, is that we are now in debt over $10,000 due to the hospital visit when my son was born and don't know what to do. It took 2 months for them to process our application for the OHP only to be denied and now 2 months of bills are building up. I feel like the state of Oregon screwed me over and I am being punished for bringing a life into this world. Is there any help out there?

Answer 1

Unfortunately this is what happens when people don't have insurance.  Now that you learned why you need insurance you should get it for the next time something unexpected happens.

As far as your current situation, contact the hospital and try to get it repriced and work out a payment plan.

Good luck,

Jeff

Answer 2

Hmmmmm.  You think the state is responsible for all this?  Why did you get pregnant if you could not afford to have a baby and had no insurance?  Oregon did not s***w you over, you did it yourself!

Contact each of the creditors and get them to lower the bills.  If insurance had paid, they would have gotten less than half of the amount.  Work with them and start paying it off.

In the meantime, get some decent jobs that include insurance.  You have another life depending on you (not the state of Oregon) now!

Answer 3

You didn't get screwed over.  You just made bad choices, and now are upset that someone else didn't pick up the pieces.

Bad Choice #1:  What fast food place doesn't offer insurance to full time employees?  Did either you or your husband (or both) turn down the opportunity for insurance coverage through work?  (By my calculations, surely you must have known you were pregnant at open enrollment time.  Even if you had previously declined insurance coverage, you could have signed up during open enrollment.)

Bad Choice #2:  Why did you wait so long to apply for Medicaid?  You're complaining that the state took 2 months to process your application...why didn't you apply earlier in your pregnancy?  This would have allowed you more leeway to develop a backup plan and/or appeal the State's decision before your child was born.

Bad Choice #3:  Not being more careful, knowing that you were uninsured and can't afford to pay the out of pocket costs for having your child.  If you can't afford to give birth to the child, how in the world are you going to handle raising him?

You're not "being punished for bringing a life into this world."  You're having to deal with the consequences of your irresponsibility.

Call the hospital and work out a payment plan.  They'll likely give a self-pay discount to you, and then you'll just have to make payments until the debt is satisfied.

And please stop blaming everyone but yourselves for the predicament you're in - part of being a good parent is learning how to be responsible, and you're learning an important (though expensive) lesson here.

Edit to add:  You *have* received real suggestions here...negotiate a cash price with the hospital, and then make a payment plan for the remaining balance.  No one is saying that you have to pay the $10K all at once, but you are going to have to make proper arrangements to deal with the issue.  There is no magic wand to make it all go away.  Find out what the hospital's self-pay discount is...you may be able to knock a few thousand off the balance.  Then arrange monthly payments for what's left.  Yes, it will take you awhile to pay it off, and no, it won't be easy.  But its the only real option you have.

Answer 4

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Answer 5

You need to call the hospital, and ask them to reprice to a cash price.

Not qualifying for welfare insurance is NOT being "screwed over".  The PROBLEM is, you guys don't make enough to cover what you want to spend (apparently), and have no health insurance.  It's not a punishmnet, it's a natural consequence.  

You COULD have done a homebirth, with all prenatal care, for under $2,000.   You chose the most expensive route.  Heck, women give birth, several a year, in those fast food restaurant parking lots on the WAY to the hospital.  

You need a plan.  Your current plan (which, btw, should be grossing you $45,000 a year full time, which is slightly over the national household average), if it's not working for you, needs to include increasing your income.  Or spending less.  Or both.  I'd STRONGLY suggest starting by signing up for health insurance with your employer.

Answer 6

I don't know how it works in Oregon, but I will share what we do in South Carolina and that might give you a place to start.  

First, talk to the finance dept at the hospital.  They should be able to set up a payment plan.  In SC, most of my health care providers allow me to do that with no interest charged.  They also are very understanding about the amount of payments.  

Most of mine I pay $50 monthly.  

The main thing to do is communicate with the people you owe.  Let them know the situation and MAKE PAYMENTS even if its just $25 or whatever, just make them regularly.  If payments are being made, you cannot be turned over to collections. All hospitals have people whose job is to help people just like you.... and me.

And don't worry about paying them off......  creditors don't look at medical bills the same way they do other debt, like credit cards and loans.

Hope this helps.  Keep trying for aid from family and children services in your community.

good luck