Doctor – The Danny Diaries

Doctor Wars Episode III: Return of My Money

A war that had been brewing silently for months has finally come to a head.

When I was writing my last blog about annoyances at the doctors offices and their billing processes, I didn’t know a third installment in this saga would come so soon.

The blog in question was the first time I’d ever written a sequel blog. Today, I bring you the third installment of what’s turned into a trilogy of epic proportions.

Star Wars, Back to the Future, The Lord of the Rings, and now: my ongoing battle with doctors hopefully concluded in this final installment:

EPISODE III: RETURN OF MY MONEY

The crazy eye doctor lady plays no part in this third installment. Thankfully, this story didn’t require any prayers.

The villain introduced in the last blog was the dentist and their billing process. It is them who I needed to defeat this time around.

To catch you up to speed: I got my wisdom teeth removed in August. Just before getting them removed, I had to talk down the oral surgeon from removing all four of my wisdom teeth because it was really only the bottom two that needed to come out. It was still going to cost me around $430 after insurance per tooth even after talking them down to just two teeth. I needed to checkout with Affirm to pay for my portion over time, but I did so and then the surgery occurred:

So months go by. I signed up with Affirm to make $75 per month payments for a year to pay off the surgery. Insurance confirmed the amount I had paid, paid their end, and then it was all about recovering and making the payments.

It was difficult dealing with my open mouth holes for a few weeks. I couldn’t have any real food for several days. My favorite thing to eat for breakfast (an everything bagel with cream cheese) was quite literally the very last thing I’d be able to eat.

But I persevered and am now fully recovered. However, the enemy was watching and waiting in silence. They knew exactly when to strike…

It was Christmas Eve.

A few short days following my best friend’s wedding and the Bears beating the Packers, I was running around the neighborhood making Christmas fudge deliveries for my mom.

My mom has THE best fudge recipe on the planet and it’s always a welcome Yuletide treat that’s shared in our home and in the homes of all our friends and loved ones.

Upon my return visiting old friends, I checked my phone to see that I had an email from the dentist saying that a new invoice had hit my account and that I owed another $150 from my surgery.

My heart sank and my temperature rose.

“FOR FUCKING WHAT?!” I said.

Apparently, my insurance policy max had been reached, but the insurance company was notified before the surgery what I was paying to ensure that they could cover it. I was baffled to believe that $150 had gone unaccounted.

I know I signed a bunch of bullshit saying that what I paid might not be a final amount, but the fact that they put a gun against my head before I got the procedure to pay the full estimated amount before I got anything done was pretty sketchy. Plus, now I owed more?

It felt like this:

I had taken out a loan with Affirm to pay for the procedure initially, so now the extra lollygagging charge pushed me past what my insurance could afford. And yes, $150 isn’t a crazy amount of money, but I still felt blindsided and wanted answers.

Since it was Christmas Eve and the day fell on a Wednesday, I would need to wait until Monday the 29th to call my insurance company to figure out what went on. So, I waited and enjoyed my Christmas…

After 4 to 6 days, I called my insurance company.

They were confused by this billing process and sent me a breakdown of what they were sent back in August following my procedure. It was for what the original cost estimation was sent to them, the same cost estimation that I based my Affirm loan on.

Both me and the insurance operator were very confused about where the $150 came from. They knew my policy was going to be maxed, but that was also based on the original estimated amount I owed. So we both felt like this:

It was time to go to war. A war that had been brewing silently for months had finally come to a head. The final straw was this smeckledorf billing job. I had to take action.

I tried to call the offices of my dentist initially, but since it was that weird work week in between Christmas and New Year’s, I didn’t reach anyone.

So, I wrote an email addressing all of my concerns. Here are the main points:

Why am I finding out about this nearly 5 months after the procedure?
The office manager sent me an email on July 14 saying I just needed to pay $802.30. I had to pay over time using Affirm and am still making payments for this procedure. Why wasn’t this cost given to me at the start?
When my insurance company was billed, the invoice didn’t match the original estimate/procedure cost. Why was my insurance overcharged unexpectedly and why wasn’t I notified about proper charges then? I called my insurance company and they were confused about this billing process as well.
This entire billing process is extremely misleading.
During the procedure, I had water splashed on my face and was awake during the second tooth extraction. Being charged extra for the anesthesia during surgery that I was awake for doesn’t make sense to me either.

I threw in the last bullet point because that was my declaration of war. If they could remember $150 after nearly 5 months, I could start remembering things from 5 months ago too.

I also didn’t make it up: I had water splashed on my face during the procedure which woke me from the anesthetic slumber and I was entirely awake for the second tooth extraction. I felt the clamp, I felt it break my tooth, and I felt them yank it out. While I was numb and couldn’t feel the pain of it, I still felt the uncomfortable pressure aspects of having your tooth yanked out.

So, I awaited my reply. Surely my declaration of war would ruffle some feathers and I would hear from them soon…

Flash forward to February: I still haven’t heard from them directly about my billing.

They’ve sent the same canned response about me owing $150 FIVE TIMES. To which I replied with the same questions I asked above FIVE TIMES.

They would not only send an email, but also send an accompanying text. This text and email both welcomed responses within the chains if I had any questions, but apparently not the questions I was asking. I’m curious if they would’ve replied sooner if I were asking these questions:

I tried the phone a couple of times as well, leaving voicemails each time, but it instructed me to also reach out by email, so it was just one big customer service loop nightmare.

In the fifth email, they threatened to send me to collections over $150.

I thought it was over. They had me dead to rights. Even though it wouldn’t be a criminal amount and despite it being a medical procedure, the billing company is some 3rd party company that would impact my credit score if I was sent to collections.

But, they slipped up. In the email threatening to send me to collections, they said “This is to notify you that you have an outstanding personal balance that is seriously past due and we have not received a response from you after multiple attempts.”

“NOT RECEIVED A RESPONSE FROM YOU”

It was my silver bullet. I had them cornered. It was time to send in my entire arsenal of pent up Irish anger that’s been boiling for generations.

Knowing I had phone records, texts, and emails with a paper trail, I was ready to call them out on their bullshit and go straight to a lawyer.

But because lawyers are expensive and Cicero’s own Saul Goodman isn’t available for my current predicament, I had to take this into my own hands.

I looked up what I could do before lawyering up and it appeared the best course of action was to “officially dispute” the bill. I didn’t know I could officially dispute anything, but as long as I disputed it in writing, it counts as an official dispute that would grant me legal protection in the hands of a collection agency if they proceeded with the billing while I was disputing it.

So, I sent them an email with the subject line:

FORMAL BILLING DISPUTE – REQUEST FOR CLEAR ITEMIZED EXPLANATION

This email laid out my original questions but instead of a polite “Thanks” to cap off the email, it ended with a threat of my own to contact the Illinois Attorney General’s Office, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and the Better Business Bureau.

Now actually feeling like Saul Goodman, I felt like I needed to not only win, but hit them where they hurt as well:

Following the dispute email, I left negative reviews on their Google Business page, Facebook page, and on Yelp.

A review which you can find here and where you can also know exactly what dentist in Chicago I don’t recommend.

Following my review postings, they called me within minutes.

They apologized for the poor communication and the experience I had and waived the final $150. They asked if I’d consider taking down my reviews and I said I’d consider it.

I haven’t considered it for a second. It’s my trophy of victory. Being on the phone with them after months of bullshit and threats to my good name to collections truly felt like this:

Following the last few years of bullshit from medical professionals, I had won.

Misdiagnoses, prayer-and-scare tactics, nothing or cancer, being billed for nothing, being misled into taking out loans to pay for a procedure, having my insurance being fucked with. All of it led to this.

The war was finally over. My money was returned.

A Yub Nub celebration across the galaxy was in order for this victory and an end to a trilogy that spanned multiple years on this blog.

Evil has been defeated and I have won. This victory was not just for me, but it was for everyone who’s ever been in this position.

This is a declaration to say you don’t have to just pay what they say. You pay what you say. It’s your life, you don’t have to take things lying down just because some official email tells you to.

You can write a blog about it and jump from SpongeBob references to Breaking Bad references all the way to Star Wars and Seinfeld references if you want. But you certainly don’t have to just pay what they say.

To anyone who says I’m being ridiculous across all three of these blogs: you’ve been broken by the American Healthcare System and the evil insurance and pharmaceutical companies that pull their strings from behind the curtain. We do not have to put up with their bullshit. Again, I don’t think the people who’re caring for folks in hospitals and saving lives are evil themselves, they’re the best of people. But they are used as pawns to deal with people like me in the grand scheme setup by these evil corporations so that those on top don’t have to answer my questions.

I mean, really, we have people who nearly bleed to death in the street wanting to call an Uber to the hospital instead of an ambulance or choose to not even go at all because it’ll be too expensive.

SpongeBob even made a reference to this:

But my full thoughts on that might just have to be a spinoff for another day…

For now, like all great trilogies, we end echoing the beginning. It’s like poetry, it rhymes:

Evil can always return. Disney might reboot my story 30 years from now. Who knows?

All I know is that I will be enjoying my victory while I can…

~DS

I’m convinced doctors exist solely to rob the hard-working American public

Touch this, feel that, $75 bucks…

I never thought I’d have to tell this story via the written word, but I’ve been left with no choice.

I referenced back in my apartment hunting blog earlier in the summer a few things that are relevant to this blog. 1) You can find a Seinfeld or Curb Your Enthusiasm reference anywhere and everywhere and 2) I had a story for another day involving me “going blind.” Well, today is that day.

The Crazy Eye Doctor

On 4th of July weekend, I headed into the eye doctor for my annual exam because I was out of contacts. All I needed to do was just re-up my prescription, take that prescription down the street to Costco, and get a couple two, tree boxes of contacts for way cheaper than they would be at the eye doctor.

One of the positives to being Irish is my blue eyes. While they are pretty, they are also very sensitive to light. Like legit, I have to wear sunglasses at the dentist still because looking up at that light is enough to make my eyes water.

The reason I was so adamant about getting new contacts the weekend of the 4th of July is because I planned on spending each moment of it drinking beer (my other Irish blessing) outside in the sun, to which I’d need sunglasses to do. I don’t have prescription sunglasses (or pool goggles), so I needed to get contacts to wear my sunglasses…following so far?

Good. Because this is where it starts to become a nightmare.

I see the doctor as soon as I’m able, which had me seeing not my typical eye doctor because I was a walk-in on 4th of July weekend. The atypical eye doctor puts me through the typical tests (I absolutely hate the puff of air one) and then sits me in the chair.

We get all the way to the final step to where I’m looking at the letters on the wall. I pass with flying colors, my prescription hasn’t changed at all and I should be good to go. But instead, the atypical eye doctor says “Oh Sweet Jesus, let me be wrong…“

I was like “Uh, wrong about what?“

You can’t just say “Sweet Jesus” for no reason. Sweet Jesus rarely comes with good tidings, at least the phrase “Sweet Jesus.”

She says “You have white blood cells in your eyes, it’s either from an infection from before or it’s a precursor to something bad.“

To which I replied “Okay….I slept in my contacts last weekend and had a stye earlier this year…could that be it?” And she said it couldn’t be.

So I ask, “What’s the something bad then?” She said “well, best case scenario: it’s nothing. Worst case scenario: it could be cancer.“

If it’s that easy to become a doctor, I should’ve fucking become a doctor. “Best Case Scenario: it’s nothing. Worst Case Scenario: It could be cancer….” I mean really? You could say that about any ailment! That’s such a wide range of possibilities, are you out of your mind lady? This is where she changed from being the atypical eye doctor to the crazy eye doctor lady.

I calmly ask, “So no contacts?” She says, “No! Not until you see a specialist, TODAY.”

She proceeds to hold my prescription hostage until I see a specialist. So I book an appointment with the specialist after being charged for my eye exam that day. So I paid for the contacts and the prescription that I wouldn’t even be receiving.

The crazy eye doctor lady then prescribed me with eye drops that I needed to take every hour until I saw the specialist, which now had to be the next morning because I couldn’t get in that afternoon.

She called me that night to make sure I was taking the drops. She then proceeds to say a prayer with me on the phone.

Now, I’m not as religious as I used to be and I’m all fine with saying a prayer, but a doctor saying a prayer over the phone is not the treatment or vibe I should be getting.

I feel like they save the prayer for somebody who’s about to pass away, not for somebody that has a few white blood cells in his eyes. That’s what the whole Anointing of the Sick is about, isn’t it?

See, I still remember some of my Catholic grade school education…

Just wait, I’m not even to the part that pissed me off so much to write this, but consider me freaked out at this point.

The Specialist

I had a 9:00 AM appointment the next morning with the specialist to find out if it was nothing or cancer.

The specialist was about an hour away, but early is on time. So I woke up early, ate a good breakfast, and left early to arrive at the doctor’s office at 8:45 AM. I knew this would require extra waiting time, but what’s 15-20 minutes?

I sat in the waiting room for an hour. What’s the point of an appointment if you wait that long? The appointment is sacred!

There’s nothing worse than the doctor’s waiting room either. Ellen always seems to be on the TV, there’s a sad bucket of toys from the Civil War era in the corner, the reading material is dry, including the constant refreshing of Twitter.

It’s 9AM on a Saturday the weekend of 4th of July so my friends aren’t even awake to make wisecrack comments to over text while I wait either.

So, I’m sitting there fuming. Because to this point, I knew there was nothing wrong with my eyes. I knew this was going to be a waste of time. I had skipped taking those eye drops that the crazy eye doctor lady made me pay $11 for because I knew she was full of shit.

Next thing I know, my name is being called. My anger sort of melted away back into nerves because of the prayer. Why would she say a prayer over the phone if nothing was wrong?

I sit in the specialist’s chair. The nurse or technician or whatever, the human embodiment of the trailers before the movie, took my info and added it into the system.

Then the specialist came in within seconds. He asked me what was up. I told him about the white blood cells, he examines my eye, and says “Oh, that’s nothing, you’re fine.“

I say, “Are you serious? Just like that?” And he says, “Just like that.“

And I say, “No more drops? I can wear contacts?” He sort of laughs and says, “Yes to both. And while I appreciate the concern of your doctor, you didn’t need these drops. You’re fine.“

I shit you not, I was in the exam room for like 3 minutes after waiting an hour.

I was so fucking happy. But then, I was furious all over again because I had wasted two days of my 4th of July weekend at the fucking eye doctor with a baseless cancer scare right in the middle of it.

The Bill

So it’s been nearly two months since this fiasco. The crazy eye doctor lady stopped holding my prescription hostage and I was back to wearing contacts that day. Although, reluctantly, mind you. She made me get a signed note from the specialist for proof, like I wanted to waste my Saturday morning an hour away from home only to say that nothing was wrong to her.

I’ve been wearing contacts for two months, my eyes are fine.

But I get a call from the specialist’s office today saying that I have an outstanding bill of $100. My insurance got it down to a $100 co-pay for a 3 minute check up with the specialist. He literally did nothing and is charging me $100.

This is where it all comes together. Why did that whole fiasco cost ME money?? What, am I seeing Sinatra in there?

I should charge the crazy eye doctor lady $1000 for the prayer and scare tactic and I should charge the specialist $100 for not keeping the appointment time and having me wait an hour only to be seen and sent off within 3 minutes.

Everything about the medical world in the United States is a gigantic scam. At least it is for me. I’m allergic to all the good antibiotics, doctors waste my time with cancer scares, and then they come out of the woodwork like loan sharks months later to collect what they think they’re “owed.”

I’m in this whole eye thing now for over $300 between the appointments and the prescriptions. Not to mention I ran up my new insurance from my new job for literally nothing.

I’m still very much for this robbery field if it benefits me. I would love to meet a nice woman that happens to be a doctor and overcharges for simple things. I would do anything and everything about domestic lifestyle that sucks, all so she never has to lift a finger other than to write a prescription for someone that doesn’t really need it. All of which would come without a single complaint knowing that I now benefit from the system that once robbed me.

A lot of this is written in jest. Of course, I’m grateful that I’m ok and I’m grateful that it isn’t more than $100. And I would be grateful with any woman crazy enough to marry me, she doesn’t have to be a doctor.

But I also know that if this happened in a decent amount of other countries, I wouldn’t have spent a dime.

I’m praying that my checking account can withstand another case of nothing.

~DS