Don't cry, it will cost you extra

A few tears shed in a New York doctor’s office turned into a torrent of protests on Twitter after the crier’s sister posted a photo of the medical bill that charged US$40 for “noticing” that the patient was crying. “She has a rare disease so she’s been really struggling to find care,” Camille Johnson, a popular YouTube and social media personality, said in a Twitter thread. “She got emotional because she feels frustrated and helpless. One tear in and they charged her $40 without addressing why she is crying, trying to help, doing any evaluation, any prescription, nothing.” The photo of the bill, which Johnson posted on May 17, went viral with more than 54,000 retweets and 425,000 likes, plus thousands of comments, according to the New York Post. The bill was from a Jan. 21 doctor’s appointment that Johnson’s sister had with an unnamed medical facility. A close-up of the bill showed a breakdown of the procedures which the doctor charged from that visit. Read: The (medical) funny pages: Met Gala looks as medical specialities But Johnson claimed that the attending doctor merely observed her sister crying and did not do the assessment which, according to the New York Post, would have involved a questionnaire that screens for signs of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, depression, anxiety, suicidal risk or substance abuse. “They did not evaluate her for depression or other mental illnesses, nor did they discuss her mental health with her,” Johnson said. “She never talked to a specialist, was not referred to anyone, not prescribed anything, and they did nothing to assist with her mental health.” Mental health screening became billable in 2015, when the Affordable Care Act was updated to include mental health services as part of the essential benefits that must be included in all insurance plans. Several members of the Twitter community responded to Johnson’s tweet with their own medical billing stories. Read: Meet Dr. Bolu Ogunyemi: ‘I probably spend more time on Twitter than I should’ “I used to work in a doctors office and they would charge for asking what medications they prescribed you. ‘Medication reconciliation,’” one person wrote. “I quit that place because I felt uncomfortable billing for things like ‘education’ when it was their job to literally tell people what’s wrong.” Another Twitter user wrote about having to surreptitiously record her doctor's visits after a previous billing issue. "I audio record my medical appts,"she tweeted. "I put my phone in DND, open Voice Memos right after check-in & hit record, then put my phone in the outer pocket of my purse microphone facing up. I fought a multi-hundred double-charge for half a year. They did NOT want to admit it happened." Read: Is misinformation the social disease of our times?

Don't cry, it will cost you extra

Register for free access or login.

Related Topics