Blame Insurance Companies for Surprise Medical Bills

Private health insurance companies routinely deny legitimate medical claims. Most denied claims for doctors are for in-network (so-called “contracted”) services. In these cases, patients never see a bill, and the doctor must separately try to resolve the dispute with the insurance company. For out-of-network (“non-contracted”) claims, however, the doctor is required by law to send the patient a bill while trying to resolve the billing dispute. Most of these denied claims are for legitimate emergency services. They are simply routine claims, not exorbitant or outlier charges as some folks lobbying for the insurance industry would have you believe.