A simple Google search tells us that 30-80% of medical bills in the U.S. are incorrect! That’s a huge range in percentages, but even if we split it right down the middle, that means at least 50% of medical bills are wrong—50% of the medical bills that are coming into your house and mine—and most healthcare consumers don’t even realize it.
Most of these incorrect bills aren’t the result of anyone—physician, hospital, billing clerk, insurance company—being malicious. On the contrary, most incorrect bills result from simple errors ranging from an incorrectly-coded diagnosis, to an in-network claim being processed out-of-network, to the front desk girl at your doctor’s office being so absorbed in her Instagram feed that she fails to enter the home address you filled out on your paperwork (I was once sent to collections as a result of a medical practice sending bills to an address I hadn’t lived at for eight years, and I can guarantee you I didn’t give them my old address when I checked in for that appointment—but I digress)…
Regardless of the cause, the average patient doesn’t realize their bills or EOBs are incorrect, because they don’t know how to decipher them. Many others realize or suspect there might be a problem with their bill, but don’t have the energy, time, or wherewithal to contact their insurance/healthcare provider/healthcare billing department (sometimes it takes repeated calls between all three) to get things figured out; instead, they simply give up and pay the bill (incidentally, this is what my husband would do in the event of my death, as he has ABSOLUTELY NO CLUE about healthcare and hates to have outstanding balances with anyone…my heart is beginning to palpitate just thinking about it).
Enter Clear Healthcare Advocacy.
What started with me spending a huge amount of time researching incorrectly-processed claims as the manager of a multi-physician office became personal as I grew in my knowledge of the medical claims and billing process and began noticing that my family’s medical bills were often incorrect. Each time I received an incorrect bill at home—and then had to use my precious time, my bachelor’s degree, and my experience as a medical practice manager just to figure things out—I became more and more convinced: I had to do something to help others who were in the same situation but didn’t have the time or ability to help themselves.
Armed with 20+ years of experience in medical office management, some time in a large hospital setting, and my degree in health information management, I became a board certified patient advocate (BCPA) in October, 2019 and took the leap to start my biz. My goal? To help overwhelmed healthcare consumers make sense of their health insurance, claims, and medical bills, so they can rest assured that what they’re paying for healthcare services is correct.
