Oh yeah, something I wanted to rant about, a billing dispute that cropped up 3 months ago.
Surgery was in August of 2023. A bill shows up for over $7,000 in January. WTF? I asks myself. I know that I jumped through all of the insurance hoops and verified this and triple checked that, as did the surgeon's office. All was set, and I paid all of the known costs before surgery.
A looong story short, is that an assistant surgeon that was in the process of accepting money from my insurance company touched me while I was under anesthesia. That is what the bill was for. But hey, guess what? Some federal legislation was enacted last year to help patients out when they cannot consent to being touched by someone out of their insurance network. These types of bills fall under something called, "surprise billing," and you don't have to put up with it.
https://www.cms.gov/nosurprises
I had to make a lot of phone calls to both the surgeon's office and the insurance company and explain my rights and what the maximum out of pocket costs were that I could be liable for. Also had to remind them that it isn't my place to be taking care of all of this and that I was going to escalate things if they could not play nice with one another.
Quick ending is that I don't have to pay that $7,000+. Advocate, advocate, advocate for yourself no matter how long it takes and learn more about this law if you are ever hit with a surprise bill.
I have no clue where to upload this, so I'll put it here. This is pre-op vs the morning of my 6 month appointment! In office I weight 232, that's 88 lbs down since my highest weight, 75 lbs since my surgery weight! I can't believe this jacket fit... I am smaller now than the last time I was this size which the surgeon found really amusing. He's happy with where I am in my weight loss and estimates I'll be around 200 lbs by my 1 year anniversary! My lowest weight as an adult is 195, so that's pretty damn exciting to think I'll be near that at a year. Everything from there will be unknown territory!!
