I suspect you're on Medicare for many years now so you see what I see.
First of all Medicare is an earned benefit that most pay for during their decades of work. So there's that. Then when you begin collecting social security there they deduct a sum of money from your check every month for Medicare. Then if you choose supplement F you pay an additional premium. All in all the price for the benefits are reasonable.
So if you look at a summary -- here is an example of what you will see. These numbers taken directly from one of my summaries and first I have to apologize for guesstimating the bill so LOW.
So I have in front of me just 4 pages of dozens --- but these appear to have the largest charges.
Amount charged: $213,913.00
Amount medicare approved: $213,913.00
Amount medicare paid: $22,026.26
Maximum you may be billed: $22026.26
Next summary
Amount charged: $113,480.00
Amount medicare approved: $113,480.00
Amount medicare paid: $11,775.88
Maximum you may be billed: $3025.66
So from just these 4 pages:
the total billed was: $327,393.00
the total approved was: $327,393.00
the total amount paid by medicare was: $33,802.14
maximum you may be billed: $25,051.92
So there... that's just a 4 pages of the bill -- I havent counted but there's probably a couple a dozen pages more.
Pretty clear how it works... Medicare negotiates the cost of the treatment and approves only a fraction of the bill --- THE HOSPITAL IS FINE WITH IT CUZ THEY ARE MAKING $$ WITH THE AMOUNT THAT IS APPROVED.
My supplement picks up the tab for the balance that Medicare doesnt pay.
So now I would guesstimate the hospital bill -- retail -- is probably more like $400-$500.k These 4 pages of summary probably have the most expensive charges.
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Oh, and the great news is I went in for my 4 month follow up recently. The follow up for Proton Bean Therapy (PBT) consist of having a DRE (digital rectal exam) and a PSA test 4 months after treatment and every 6 months thereafter for 5 years.They want the PSA reading to be 50% or less than what it was prior to treatment. My pre-treatment PSA was 3.8 so that means looking for a number of 1.9 or less.
Last week I had both test done. Urologist did the DRE and said prostate smaller with no nodules. PSA was .3.
So far so good. Urologist said I'm the poster boy for PBT. Very thankful I was able to get the PBT.
I highly recommend PBT treatment for prostate cancer. |
