They shouldn’t send these to people with heart conditions

The bill from the hospital came today.
This is when I kneel down and thank Kaiser Permanente… and myself for paying a $217 premium for my own insurance every month since I arrived in California.
$125,067.16.
This is just the bill from Good Samaritan Hospital, it doesn’t include the Kaiser costs. Hey, don’t you think a hospital with a name like “Good Samaritan” should be free?
This is for one night in the hospital, the angioplasty, and drugs. $43,080 of that seems to be the stents that were implanted in me, so I now have three teeny tiny bits of mesh in my veins that cost more than my car. Or anything else I own other than my house. Good thing they’re implants, I wouldn’t want to lose something so valuable.

$1,128 of that is for EKGs. In other words, every time someone came in and stuck wires all over me and spent about 1 minute with a little machine on a cart, it cost $300. At least I got to keep the little stickers all over my body, I was finding them for days after.
These costs are astronomical, and it makes me wonder if the medical system isn’t completely, irrevocably broken — I can only assume there are two reasons for such high costs, a) because they can and b) because they are trying to cover the costs of people who can’t pay. Ultimately, in this situation, they will be paid by my HMO, who will keep raising rates every year to keep up until, eventually, no one in this country will be able to afford health insurance, just as they know can’t afford heath care without it.
Still to come is the bill from my HMO, Kaiser. With the plan that I have, I expect it to come to about $500. That’s fantastic, and it’s exactly why I signed up for the plan I did — to protect me from catastrophic illness that would leave me bankrupt and homeless. That gamble paid off well, since in the last year I have paid Kaiser a total of $2,800 in premiums. Still, if Kaiser has just lost $121,700 or more on the deal, how do they stay in business?

Speaking of Kaiser, I went to my first doctor’s appointment today. I have to say that after years of difficult-to-deal-with HMOs, my new Kaiser membership is something of a revelation. I can easily see it as the basis for a national health system. I made the appointment a few days ago — I did it over the phone since I wanted to get in quickly, but their website lets you make appointments as well. In I went this morning, paid a $25 copay for the visit, and got to chat with the doctor as long as I wanted. The flat fee for seeing the doctor is nice; I’ll go in for an ultrasound on my leg next week ($25) and a follow-up with may cardiologist at the end of the month ($25). Easy peasy, which is good considering that I have avoided doctors for at least the last decade. Heck, I will probably end up joining some wellness classes at Kaiser, because they make it so easy and cheap. Which, of course, keeps their members healthier and reduces their doctor visits… that must be how they do it!