Medicare & Medicaid regecting ambulance charge

[ghostjmf]

for ride that took my brother to hospital. What followed, if you remember my posts from this winter, were 3 operations in which they removed 5 feet of dead intestine.

The insurance agencies have letter from the doctor saying "this man would have died" had he not been brought in immediately. They prefer to believe the report of the ambulance staff saying "this man's vital stats say he wasn't in danger". They also say he wasn't in pain. Apparently he was trying too successfully not to scream.

Brother says further appeals require info that has nothing to do with his intestines.

He was in too much pain to drive, & lives in a place where you're lucky if the taxi you called ever comes. No, he doesn't have device to call Uber/Lyft, & they probably won't come either.

[BackInTex]

for ride that took my brother to hospital. What followed, if you remember my posts from this winter, were 3 operations in which they removed 5 feet of dead intestine.

The insurance agencies have letter from the doctor saying "this man would have died" had he not been brought in immediately. They prefer to believe the report of the ambulance staff saying "this man's vital stats say he wasn't in danger". They also say he wasn't in pain. Apparently he was trying too successfully not to scream.

Brother says further appeals require info that has nothing to do with his intestines.

He was in too much pain to drive, & lives in a place where you're lucky if the taxi you called ever comes. No, he doesn't have device to call Uber/Lyft, & they probably won't come either.

Hmmm.....Bobbie says they work so well.

Blue Cross had no problem paying for my ambulance ride, and way before the HCA. I was awake, fully lucid, in no pain. Mildly disappointed they didn't use the siren.

[ghostjmf]

They paid all the hospital & physician charges. Its just the $600.00 ambulance charge they reject.

[BackInTex]

They paid all the hospital & physician charges. Its just the $600.00 ambulance charge they reject.

Blue Cross paid everything.

What is happening here is they want you, next time, to think about that ambulance charge, so that maybe next time they only have to cover the autopsy and embalming.

[jarnon]

Some elderly patients use an ambulance in place of a taxi, bus or paratransit, or they think they'll jump to the head of the line at the ER if they arrive in an ambulance. But to deny coverage for a life-threatening emergency is just greedy.

[ghostjmf]

BiT: Jews don't enbalm. We bury quickly. Supposed to be in pine box. Moslems also don't embalm, & bury quickly in winding sheet, I've read.

Autopsy, with Jews, is only if law/medical profession requires.
.

Fortunately, no-one has died.

I have a feeling this is a case of diff branches of Medicare & Medicaid following diff rule sets &/or not talking to each other.