A few thoughts on Medical debt

[Guest guest]

Dear Friends,

Thank you so much for the comments and insights to my letter. I

truly appreciate them and hope to answer some of the people who are

having tough economic times. In fact, if you are in that boat, free

information is always the way to go. In all honesty I would

recommend that you continue to get Magic information for free. I was

hoping and praying that the advice in the earlier letter would

inspire savings, not create guilt over our resources or the lack

thereof.

O.K. Let's face it. Medical debt sucks. Sorry for the profanity

but I really can't think of an " appropriate " word that would convey

the absolute yuckiness of the situation. Five months ago, our

medical debt exceeded how much my husband brings home in a month.

Obviously, since we had to pay the mortgage and car loan, all the

dr.s didn't get paid in one fell swoop. However, there are options

with medical debt and I would like to share a few tips.

Medical debt cannot be used against you on a credit application or

even refinancing your home which we found out last year in our

process. The mortgage broker was asking to name my debt and after

the car loan and existing mortgage I started listing the hospital

and specialist bills we had on Connor. " Those don't count! " she

said. " Whoppeeee " I said!

In addition to medical debt not affecting your credit rating, many

hospitals and specialists will take a payment plan but you have to

be up front with them from the start. Last October I had to have

emergency gall bladder surgery. Even though our insurance covered

it, we had over 1,000.00 to pay off. I'm still paying on it. I

went to the hospital billing department, explained that I had a son

with a rare genetic disorder and that we had several medical bills

we were whittling down. No problem. Payment plan set up. Here we

go.

Don't be afraid to ask for some dr.s or specialists, or hospitals to

even forgive the debt. I belong to a support group locally called

Project . I know of some parents with children who have

severe medical complications and the parents were out of work had

some of the debt forgiven. Hey, miracles do happen. However, I

think you need to be honest and ask for them.

Be as savvy shopping for a specialist as you are shopping for a car.

(Obviously this doesn't apply is you have a HMO that limits you to

certain specialists). If you know anyone in the medical community,

ask them whose best at genetics, or endocrinology or speech

therapy. Call ahead. Ask questions like, " Are you willing to

update yourself on the research needed to adequately treat my

child? " If they say yes, or no, base your plan of direction on

that. I had to shop for a local pediatrician after letting the

first one go. Instead of showing up for an office visit and paying

for it, I found out ahead of time if the doc was even interested in

dealing with the complexity of treating my son. Plus, the

individual had to be humble enough to know that I probably know more

about RSS than they do and would be teaching them what to look for.

This isn't arrogance. It is parental advocacy at it's best.

Finally, as the good book says, " This to shall pass. " It does

eventually get better.

Submitted with heartfelt sincerity and no intentions of hurting

anyone's feelings about our economic situations...