UVA Health System revamps aggressive debt collection practices after report

[mahatmakanejeeves]

See Eugene's thread a few lines down.

David Fahrenthold Retweeted

BREAKING: UVA Health System revamps aggressive debt collection practices after KHN investigation published in WaPo. But independent experts said new policy still leaves numerous patients exposed to lawsuits and crippling bills.

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UVA Health System revamps aggressive debt collection practices after report

By Jay Hancock, Elizabeth Lucas and Kaiser Health News
September 13, 2019 at 10:54 a.m. EDT

UVA Health System, which sues thousands of patients each year, seizing wages and home equity to collect on overdue bills, said Friday it would increase financial assistance, give bigger discounts to the uninsured and “reduce our reliance on the legal system.”

“This will have a huge impact on patients to the good,” Doug Lischke, the health system’s chief financial officer, said in an interview. The changes will “positively, drastically reduce the legal process” of lawsuits, garnishments and property liens, he added.

Lischke called the new policy “a first step” that could later include additional financial assistance. He said the state-owned health-care system also plans to ask the Virginia General Assembly to change a law requiring state agencies including health systems to “aggressively collect” unpaid bills and charge 6 percent interest on the balance.

But independent experts said the policy change, which comes on the heels of a Kaiser Health News investigation published in The Washington Post detailing the public medical center’s aggressive collection practices, still leaves numerous patients exposed to lawsuits and crippling bills. KHN found that UVA sued patients more than 36,000 times over six years ending in June 2018, sending many families into bankruptcy. It routinely billed uninsured patients for far more than what a typical insurance company would have paid.
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Hancock is a senior correspondent and Lucas is data editor for Kaiser Health News (KHN), a nonprofit news service covering health issues. It is an editorially independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation that is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

[SWBTATTReg]

1. Keep their ugly practices in the spotlight...it's too bad that public opinion has got to be used...

to rein in these ugly and aggressive practices. Also, their highly suspect billing practices for uninsured persons isn't being disputed or the like, when in fact, it should be. Where is the state of Virginia?

I suspect that they are all repugs (or at least they are all in control there). I hope not, for these tactics and practices for illnesses not willingly brought on by those suffering enough as it is, should not be allowed.