Bureaucracy Bullshit

Yesterday, I received a shocking piece of mail: a collections letter in the amount of $40 that Allegheny General Hospital claimed that I owed.  My first reaction when I saw the collections letter was shock and then quickly moved to blind fury.  I have never been sent to collections, and I certainly would never duck out on a $40 bill.  I've paid all my other bills and co-pays, so what the hell happened?

I called Allegheny General Hospital's billing department a call first.  The rep was unsympathetic to my request for help and an explanation as to how it happened.  I quickly went into snide, bitch mode with her when I figured out she had no interest in helping me.  I admit, it's not the best way to deal with hospital billing departments, but when you mess with my credit, I will cut a bitch.  The rep repeatedly said, "Well, there isn't anything I can do.  My notes have showed that we have talked with you about this."

Bull shit.

"No, you haven't," I argued and then a light bulb went off in my head.  "Oh, you mean all the robo-calls you have been sending my phone?"

"What do you mean 'robo-calls'?" she countered.  "We talked to you."

"No, you did not.  I received a handful of automated messages telling me to call back Allegheny General Hospital at whatever number," I said.

"Well, that's how the billing department operates.  You had to call us back."  

"Are you kidding me?  Nobody calls back robo-calls.  My name's been put in some sort of cancer database.  I didn't know that you weren't inviting me to some lecture or what.  The message was vague."

Her and I went back and forth and it went nowhere fast.  She treated me like I was some sort of dead-beat who didn't want to pay back a $40 bill.  Bitch, I pay my bills and on time.  I actually said to her, "Come on, my situation isn't dire where I can't pay a $40 bill.  I've paid all the rest of my bills and you think I'm trying to avoid $40?"

After I got off the phone with her, I called the actual collection agency to talk with them about it.  I explained to the rep that I wanted to look into this further, but if I find that I do owe this, I"ll call back and pay it off.  No problem.  The rep was very helpful and gave me details that the hospital billing department wouldn't: like the doctor I went to see.  She also said that I should look at my EOBs and try to figure out what was owed. 

"Great idea, thanks.  I keep all my EOBs and in chronological order.  And they think I didn't pay a bill."  The collection agent and I had a nice, hearty laugh.

I went up to my big book of cancer and looked at the EOBs.  I found the one in question but the kicker: I went into my old bills and pulled out the most recent one, which was the $40 bill they said I didn't pay.  For each hospital bill, I write down the date I paid it and how I paid it (i.e. online or what check number).

I called my dad, who I had been calling throughout the frustrating ordeal, after I confirmed online that I paid the bill, "THOSE FUCKERS SENT ME TO COLLECTION FOR A BILL I PAID.  AAAAAAAH."

When I called back the hospital's billing department, I talked to another representative with OUTSTANDING customer service.  She tried arguing with me that I didn't pay.  "No," I calmly said.  "I paid online.  I'm looking at proof that you guys received $40 from me."

This rep, Mindy, looked further into my account (taking her all but one minute) and said, "It looks like since you didn't put the account number, it went to another outstanding balance of over $300 you have."

"What other outstanding balance?  I haven't received any bills from you guys.  If you don't bill me, then how are you to receive money?" I asked her, fuming.  "Okay, so you see that I paid the bill that is in collections.  You know, messing with my credit."

"Well, that's still owed.  Since you didn't write the account number, it went to the other bill.  They have different account numbers.  You get a different account number for every visit."  

"Wait, seriously?  Why don't I just have one account, which would avoid confusion like this?"

"That's reserved for patients in long-term care."

"Long-term patients.... like CANCER?  Okay, I don't know how 10 plus months of treatment doesn't qualify me as a long-term patient but okay then."

Mindy said that she would take my bill out of collections and actually BILL ME for the $280 I supposedly owe.  

What a cluster-fuck of incompetence, unhelpful customer service reps, and a messed up billing system.  I've been writing my Cancer Story these past couple of weeks.  I think I'm going to devote a couple of chapters on how to deal with the bureaucracy and bullshit that comes with being sick.  You don't have to deal with treatment, you get to deal with insurance companies AND hospital billing departments.  It's the trifecta of evil.

Allegheny General Hospital of Pittsburgh, I can see now why you are the SECOND-BEST hospital system in Pittsburgh.  You truly fucking suck and are incompetent.

This ones goes out to Allegheny General Hospital

I am so sick and tired of Allegheny General Hospital, but unfortunately I don't have the option of going anywhere else for my care.  The other major hospital system does not accept my health insurance so I'm stuck.  

Let me refresh your memory or bring you to speed if you haven't been reading this from the beginning: after my partial mastectomy and lymph node removal surgery, supposedly the cancer specimen should have been shipped off for an Oncotype test.  Well, that didn't happen.  By the time I saw my medical oncologist (3 or so weeks after my surgery), he told me that he wanted to wait until the Oncotype test came back.  He had to send it because the surgeon's office didn't.  When the results came back (3 WEEKS LATER), they were inconclusive because the specimen had started to deteriorate.  

When I tried to get someone at AGH to explain this and maybe go, "Gee, Lara, we are so sorry that you waited three weeks for nothing."  I just got excuses from one of the hospital administrators, and the surgeon's office said, "We don't know what you're talking about.  We don't do Oncotype test."  So I had my medical oncologist telling me that the surgeon should have sent this, and the surgeon going, "The fuck you talking about, Willis."  

My New Year's Day Neulasta shot, which was supposed to only be a quick trip to the 6th floor of the hospital, turned out to be a two-hour stay.  When I registered for the shot, I was somehow registered at another hospital location... not the actual location where I was at.  When my oncology nurse found out a couple days after the fact, she apologized profusely for the mixup.  She vowed to find out what happened and would get back to me.

She never did get back to me with any answers.

Just recently, I was the last one out of recovery because it took them hours to find me a bed/room.  They caused my dad and boyfriend to wait hours.  I was done with my surgery around 1 or so.  I didn't get into a room until almost eight o'clock that night.  The nurses in the recovery room told me that I should be really pissed when I get my postcard from AGH, asking how my stay was.  Something like that.  I have yet to receive this postcard.

Now, a nurse told me that my radiation oncologist said I could have started radiation a week after my thyroid surgery, since I didn't have any contrast.  A WEEK AFTER MY SURGERY WAS MAY 3.  I'm just getting my planning scan (whatever the hell that is) tomorrow.  What makes me nervous and anxious: I was told that I had a 4 to 6 week window from my last chemo to start radiation.  Well, that window ended on MAY 5.  I'm a cancer patient with anxiety problems, and now I am starting the final phase of my treatment.... a week or so after a quoted time frame.

They better not fucking dismiss me when I see them tomorrow.  I was delayed prior to starting chemo, and now I have been delayed prior to starting radiation.  I am having panic attacks thinking that this is just screwing with my prognosis and this eight/nine months have been FOR NOTHING.  I'm going to need my doctor, one of them, convince me with hard evidence that my long-term survival rate hasn't been affected.  I have to tell you, waiting weeks to have your body go through complete hell is not fun.

I just want this to be over.  I want my life back.

In case anyone was wondering

Since my surgeon didn't order the Oncotype test after my surgery last month and it got postponed until my oncologist could order it, I'm not going to start any treatment until probably the second week of November.  (I was diagnosed with cancer on September 22 - srsly.)  I've been told they can't do anything until the test gets back and on Friday, I was told that would take 10 to 14 days.  Thank you, health care system.  I don't know what's going to kill me first - cancer or my patience.

Congrats Lara - you have cancer.  Now you get to wait weeks on end just to get the sucker fully out of your body.  Haha, we don't care that your anxiety is getting worse and worse the longer you wait.  You're not a person to us - just a Socical Security number. 

I guess the only bright side to my surgeon's fuck up is that I can enjoy a week or two of normalcy before becoming a full-time cancer patient.  Plus I won't be in the hospital when my boyfriend has his 40th birthday.  Still, I'm not enjoying this wait whatsoever.  While I'm not looking forward to surgeries or chemotherapy, I just want to get this train moving.  The quicker it starts, the quicker it ends.

I haven't even started my treatment and I'm already falling through the cracks.  This can't be good.