This is the first time I have heard of a patient who fired God!

I don’t know of many family doctors who accept Medicare; guess there will not be many patients who will have the opportunity to fire them.

You sound like a real jerk yourself, and no doubt been fired fot it too.

But it seems odd that he wouldn’t be aware of the paycheck deductions for Medicare and his former health insurance premiums. Even Social Security checks have the part B premiums automatically deducted.

It could be that he has a wife who’s always handled all the bills, and he has just never paid attention to what money’s coming in, and what is going out.

Or he’s elderly enough that he doesn’t understand anymore who pays what for medical care. My elderly father no longer understands what a medical bill is, or who pays it. He hasn’t been able to understood this for a good 8 years. And he used to be an accountant.

I still have to say, the story about the retired man seems odd.

I wish I was your doc and you fired me. I had to quit accepting medicare last year and I need the remaining 150-200 medicare patients to fire me.

You should look at some other options.
A medical savings account would be one, making sure you understand how the rules work.
The other thing would be putting money aside, maybe in a liquid CD or something, then getting insurance with a high deductible to get your upfront cost down. All you really need protection for are the potential 5- and 6-figure (or more) bills that are not so likely but catastrophic if they would happen.
And make sure you’re not short-changing yourself by not having disability insurance.

I am not there yet, and so if it happens this year, then I am ahead. If I remain basically healthy without really major stuff for another 6 years or so, then we can, retrospectively, say that I purchased peace of mind am financially the loser in not being willing to take more risk.

It is just a personal finacial decision like any other and the government should not make it for people.

Hell we even know that we pay out more in prescriptions, than what our retirement check is for. We know that all those tests medicare doesn’t cover we pay for. We know we pay our 20% co pay on services that are covered by medicare so unless this guy was suffering from severe dementia, which you don’t mention. Kevin, is just once again messing with the folks on medicare. God, if you were my Doc. I would fire you so damn fast.

Also, I think this was total including prenatal care.

My brother and his wife had a child while uninsured. As soon as he knew that she was pregnant, he went to the hospital’s business office. They had a deal whereby for a fixed fee paid now, he was covered for all routine services and any complications that arose. It was about 2500 or so 5 years ago. It was sort of like insurance for a specific episode. I thought it was a great deal and smart for the hospital also. We have a lot of uninsured in this area, especially among young adults of child-bearing age. By rolling the fee into an insurance product, the hospital induced people to pay up front, and they got peace of mind with regard to finances months before delivery.

I think they would have still been bare to huge bills if the child were serverly handicapped or something. I am sure that wasn’t covered. But that sort of thing exceeds many people’s lifetime caps anyway. You can’t insure against everything.