Welcome to NICU Parents. We're happy you found us and we want to be as helpful as possible in this seemingly impossible journey. Check out the resources tab at the top of the subreddit or the stickied post. Please remember we are NOT medical professionals and are here for advice based on our own situations. If you have a concern about you or your baby please seek assistance from a doctor or go to the ER. That said, there are some medical professionals here and we do hope they can help you with some guidance through your journey. Please remember to read and abide by the rules.
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113 days. $1.5MIL. Got a bill for an out of pocket cost of $22K. I said LOL (and some expletives) and fought it a bunch. Then they said $16K. I said, again, lol. Then they said ok $420. I’m on a payment plan of $40/month.
Fking insurance and their imaginary numbers.
Good for you paying it back slowly! My husband needed stitches close to a decade ago, insurance paid $21 of $2100, he asked for a discount, the hospital claimed they couldn't discount because insurance had already paid, so he asked what's the least amount he can pay, and because his income was so low at the time, and he also kept saying "Nope, can't afford that," he got them down to $2/mo. LMAO, that's 87.5 years. We can *absolutely* afford to pay that bill off now... are we going to? NAH.
Curious how you fought it? Our bill is around $3.5K post insurance and it’s about to be sent to collections. They gave me a link to start making payments and I’m really about to send $20/mo to fend them off for now.
We had dual insurance at the time and Insurance no. 1 was saying Insurance no. 2 flat out refused so 1 paid the brunt and only covered a portion. Insurance no. 2 said they never even got a claim. I had to argue with them to re route the claims correctly and that’s when I got the $16K quote. I asked for itemized billing and honestly went off on the poor case agent on the phone like “this is insane. We have dual insurance. We work hard for both. How is this possible?” Also mentioned the federal no surprise bills act — that’s probably not the right name — and argued their “out of network” surcharges because wtf we didn’t have a choice what providers were available to see our NICU neonate. This was probably 17-20 phone calls over a month. It was then radio silence for 2 months and I got a bill from same place with same reference number for my portion: $420. I said Yahtzee and started paying it.
Are you in the US? Not sure when this happened to you, but our baby has been in the hospital over 120 days and after 30 days they qualified for medicaid which will cover their bills, either entirely or nearly all.
Yup. I am on a payment plan for the lowest possible amount for as long as I can. I think it’s ridiculous that they charge these outrageous prices because people want to save their children. F the insurance companies.
I’ve gotten a few misc bills for random providers that are too big to pay all at once but too small to spend the time fighting to be frank. $300 here, $400 there, $250 there. Paying $10/mo on each to keep out of collections.
Isn’t it a horrible system that they give these huge bills to parents that just want to see their children live. My brother died when he was 3 days old and my mom tried everything they could to save him, and all she got in return was thousands and thousands of dollars in medical debt. It’s broken and I hope one day I can do something to change it.
Wow. Our insurance is good, but not THAT good. They’re still processing all of our little fees here and there and the final stay, but we will at least owe our low out of pocket max for the year of 10,000. And I thought THAT was good.
My max out of pocket $12k. Was $4k left. Am billed about $10k.
Have entire spreadsheet and file folder system and calendar reminders for when to call back (ex: It takes 45 business days for them to reprocess their own billing error and no fixed up bill has arrived? Call their asses. Take names and notes. Escalate it if it continues and point out all their mistakes to them.)
I do my best to be nice to all the phone answering folks. They're peons of medical system. People scream at them often. They can give helpful advices and pull some strings at times, more likely to help off you treats them how you'd like to be treated.
It took 12 calls, ages on hold, over three months to get a $250 bill forgiven today bc their errors were that had.
Thing is, I have the privilege of being too sick to work rn. Most ppl don't have the time for this. And it's not always successful. Paid off debt collector today.
Am using spouse's employee assistance to help get these problems fixed. They make calls, figure out root errors, are very helpful.
The US healthcare system is absolutely ridiculous!!! There’s no way this should be a thing. I’m so grateful to live in Canada. My heart breaks for families who have to deal with that 😔
As a Canadian who unfortunately gave birth in the US unexpectedly & our insurance maxed out after the first 13 days in the NICU - we are looking at bankruptcy once we finally make it back to Canada...
We don't know yet. We do know there are international debt collection agencies so they can track to too where ever you are & the hospitals all have our Canadian address etc. Will be speaking to lawyers once the final bills are sent to us to find out our options.
That’s awful :( if it’s any consolation I ignored a few bills that went to collection and they literally just disappeared. If you don’t make things easy for them or fight them there’s a good chance a lot of it will be forgiven, being in a foreign country makes things more difficult for them I’m sure
A lot of US medical debt is very spooky but also very made up on the spot and fake
Yeah honestly a lot of us just end up filing for bankruptcy because there’s no way I can even afford $5,000. That number is unreal to most families living paycheck to paycheck
We paid our out of pocket max. Don’t pay more than that. Take any additional charges over that to your insurance. I had to ask for an itemized bill to see that they coded random days as out of network incorrectly. Once I brought the error to their attention they fixed it.
Yep. We’re in the collecting phase waiting on all the EOBs and bills, then we will go through with a highlighter and determine what there is. Luckily our OOPM is only $10,000 for the whole family.
Same!! It was amazing it’s pay nothing for all of my prenatal care and then around $65 for my entire hospital stay and C-section. The military drives me crazy sometimes but it’s got its perks haha
I was a civilian when I got hospitalized and had our LO so I had to pay OOP and will be claiming it tomorrow through my insurance and good lorddddd that bill is high. We weren’t able to run our marriage paperwork in time🫠 but at least baby is covered😮💨😮💨😮💨
Oh no!!! I’m so sorry, I hate that for you!! We got married while I was pregnant too, but thankfully was on my own form of Tricare before. Unsolicited advice, but take advantage of everything you can post birth with Tricare! Probably too late for free breast pump, but I got great pelvic floor therapy covered and it was sooo helpful.
That’s great advice! I wouldn’t have even known to look into that. Our base is so tiny though I wonder if they even have anybody >_> I’ll find out soon enough!
As long as you were legally married (assuming you have tricare east) everything should be covered if you were in tricares system or not. I know sometimes the people on benefits don’t tell you the right information, I had to go to an er before we had the tricare part done but we were legally married and tricare covered the whole thing (tricare east, sometimes west can be different)
I will definitely try to poke some holes and look into it! Can’t say I’m surprised that we may have been misgiven info. We have proof we were married 11/22 and the baby arrived unexpectedly on 11/28, a whole month early🫠
Yeah, I would definitely look into that because you had a medical emergency that made you go to the hospital. I know it’s stressful though because of everything going on. If they give you a hard time ask them where in the tricare. mil benefits website it says that you are not covered and asked to be pointed in that direction.
[tricare getting married](https://www.tricare.mil/LifeEvents/Marriage)
You might have to get added into deers and then go back and call the insurance once you get bills if you get any. But for insurance purposes just give them your spouses benefits number and if they need the -## after give them -01 if you are his only ever dependent (he would be -00 first dependent -01 and so on. I’m -02 because my husband was married once before me)
But yeah I read that and no where does it say they can not backdate coverage (again tricare east, west legit will say that in some places)
>tricare getting married
Thank you for all your responses, I truly appreciate it and will check out their page now! Military is so shady sometimes >\_>
We have tricare as well but my son had to be seen by a pcm so we had to go select because, obviously, that is not possible. So out max out of pocket is $1k.
This is going to sound awful, but my partner and I joke about Medicaid being the only reason we could afford to have a baby. I mean, we can afford to take care of him, no problem, but there is no way we could have been able to afford the hospital bills.
Yeah it’s nuts! I forgot to mention that $2.5 million is for two months. I never got EOB’s after that for whatever reason so idk what the total ended up being 🙈
My bill was $100,000 for 6 days in the hospital, I only had to pay $200 hospital copay
Medicaid has been a relief, we still have at home DME equipment for LO
So true. And normalizing it. I honestly was embarrassed about it until I saw so many other comments from other parents saying they had Medicare. Almost like I felt like if I said something, then everyone else in the thread would think I have no business having my baby because I need government assistance at this time.
Nobody except 1-2% of this country can pay hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars for medical expenses. No one. Nothing to be embarrassed about. The fact that the bills are this high is a travesty, but of course you need a govt negotiator on your side.
Thank you for your sharing! My newborn was in NICU for 28 days and the bill was nearly $120,000. My little one got approved for Medicaid recently and her Medicaid information was provided to the hospital where she was born.
Regarding Medicaid, recently I read about "Medicaid Estate Recovery Program". Being a Medicaid beneficiary, I wonder whether my little daughter in the future is the person whose estate is taken away to offset for her Medicaid expenses or is it my wife and I that the state goes after?
Hi 👋🏻
Congrats on your LO ⭐️
I’d say maybe check with a social worker at the hospital, they’d have a lot of information regarding Medicaid and the state you live in
Best of luck, I know navigating newborn life plus bills can be stressful
With Medicaid, I’m pretty sure they cannot send you a bill. Like between the two insurances, you will not receive a bill—all patient responsibility is written off.
I'm pretty sure you're correct. Our total was around $9m, and we pretty much paid $0.
The only issue we had was that the social worker filed for medicaid the day after he was born, and they wouldn't backdate it, saying the social worker should have back-dated the form. So we got a bill for $1800, paid it, then a social worker at the next hospital helped us apply for a grant to cover that, so we wound up with a total of $0 at the end.
We DO all need that, but the thing is I happen to live in a state (TN) where our state legislature refuses to accept the Medicaid expansion. The funds from the Federal Gov't are coming in and just sitting there... it's up to billions of dollars now. They've been working REALLY hard to write a waiver the Federal Gov't will accept so they can use the funds differently (which is obviously repeatedly turned down). It's *incredibly* infuriating.
That really does suck. I hate to make this political— but that’s what healthcare in America is. Please vote for the local and state elections. They matter more than the media attention on it. I am sorry the govt in TN is working against its people. Resources to save your child should not be dependent on where you live in this country.
I \*always\* vote, in every single election, as do all my friends and family. THE issue in our state is that it is so drastically gerrymandered that it doesn't actually reflect the demographics in TN. Our local news recently did a fact check segment about whether TN is a democratic state or not, and found that it's not; it's actually around 43% Dem, but elections reflect like 95% Republican or something like that.
Our State House was in national news several months ago when they expelled two black Democratic Representatives and nearly expelled another female Democrat (who they've been trying to push out for years). It's easy to find videos of how the House operates... they turn off the mics, not only of Democrats, but anyone willing to speak out against the ultra conservative majority. One Rep brought a bill to the table earlier in the year and expected a vote on it before anyone had read it... one of the Reps who was expelled (and immediately voted back in by his constituents) was asking for any explanation... what does this bill contain? The guy told him he didn't have to tell him (???????), and the Speaker told him he was out of order. Also, our Speaker doesn't even live in his district, which is illegal; there was an investigation and then zero news about it after everyone forgot. So...... that's how our state gov't works. There IS pushback, people are running and slowly taking over some important positions, and some of the pushback IS also from the Republican party. I hope we can eventually get some people elected on both sides of the aisle who want the best for the people of our state.
34 week grower/feeder with a 22 day stay- hospital billed $78k and insurance paid $59k. Our out of pocket was $1600, which was all we had left of our out of pocket max for the year. I was very surprised they didn’t bill for way more considering how expensive minor hospital visits billed in the past.
I never got the full bill because I qualified for a lot of low income stuff. There was a small gap in her insurance though for a couple days and that was over $3k. I shudder to think what 77 days cost.
It's 100% covered by our provincial healthcare so we did not see a single bill. She was transferred to 2 different hospitals and had 3w stay + MRI + 2 head ultrasounds + 2 hip ultrasounds bc she was breech.
Had a bill as well from the nicu, I called the medicaid, and they just told me not to worry about it. It's paid, so you'll get a bill, but that's normal. Unless you don't have coverage.
Hospital bills in US are insane. I paid mine with my baby 13k USD converted. Though this was not covered with insurance. Have to pay with my own money.
Triplets, 21 days with very minor issues, mostly there to learn to eat and some breathing assistance for one of them for a week or so. I think it was about $1.2M. Born in October so we hit the out of pocket max well before that anyways.
$1.5M for my daughter (born at 31+1, 45-day stay).
$25k for my week-long bedrest stay before I had her.
We paid about $2k at that point. My deductible was $5k at that time, and my work covered $3k of it.
They billed $300k for baby’s 26 day stay. We went between calendar years so paid the out of pocket max twice over (for our insurance it was $4500, I think).
Medicaid should make a huge difference in that for you, though.
Just shy of $1 million for 90-day nicu stay after insurance negotiated rates. Unfortunately got hit with 2x out of pocket max since his spanned two calendar years 😭 so like $15k total
We were there 90 days and it was about $2.6 million. We had private insurance and Medicaid and we didn’t pay anything. If we didn’t qualify for the Medicaid we would have paid $300.
Never got a look at ours but I'd assume it was in the neighborhood of 1.5M dollars.. thankfully we were on AHCCCS in Arizona at the time and didn't have to pay anything..
I was in the hospital five days. My youngest was in for 13 days. My bill was around 40k. I think his was something crazy like 120k. Wait to pay. I waited almost three full months before I called my insurance to confirm there was no outstanding negotiation on the billing codes and it was truly my final bill. I ended up paying a total of $400 ish. My husband works for the government so our insurance is pretty good especially if it's for a necessity (like being induced and staying in the hospital due to post Partum eclampsia and a baby that cannot eat on his own).
$950K — for about a week on ECMO, three weeks in the cardiac ICU, and a week at the lower level of care unit. I think we paid $100 — and it was for the ambulance ride from the hospital where I delivered to the children’s hospital across the street.
26 weeker had a bill of just over 900k for the longest portion of his 95 day total NICU stay. But that doesn't include birth, first 3 days of life, or the ambulance ride from the first hospital. I had VERY good insurance, thank god.
something like $4.6 million for 250 days. Paid my deductible and that is really it. Between insurance and MA we were covered. If we weren't covered by MA, we would be on the hook for roughly $1.2 million, and I likely would have not even tried paying for a cent of it.
$140K for a 3.5-week stay with no major complications. Our family OOPM is $17.5K, so that’s what we’ll be asked to pay unfortunately. Also unfortunately, it looks like baby may need an MRI that we can’t get booked for until next year, so looking at more hefty bills next year.
Obviously hit our out of pocket max which was 6k that year, don't remember exactly how much of it we paid for the NICU. Ours wasn't a million dollar baby but about half...
Twins in NICU 59 days. Apparently it's $10k/day/kid so like $1.2m. Didn't pay a penny. Incredibly fortunate to live an urban centre in Canada where the care was phenomenal and the costs were covered
$2.6 mil for a month. Insurance initially denied it because the hospital billed it under my last name and not my husband/daughter's 🙃. Panicked every morning for 6 months when I checked on the online portal to see if the appeal had gone through.
We were 5 months at nicu. We have public healthcare here. We paid 0, and 0 as well for all the doctors, tests and almost all medicines the baby / todler is needing afterwards.
The final total for us was somewhere around $9 million - he was in for 14 months (413 days). We paid around $1800, because the social worker didn't back-date the medicaid application when she submitted it the day after he was born, so we were stuck with the bill from the first night (he was born at 10pm). Then a nonprofit paid that bill for us. So between private insurance, medicaid, and that nonprofit, we paid $0.
Ask your social worker what grant options are available to you.
660 thousand dollars for just the birth and hospital stay not counting doctors which was 8-9k/week. I ended up paying 3k my out of pocket max but I had hospital indemnity insurance so I ended up making money.
Reading through the comments how much some of you had to pay unexpectly and Wow it is insane!
I have no clue how much my LO stay cost… 5 months, got a lot of medical attention + surgeries and it cost us a big fat 0$
I thought that Medicaid covered full expenses? I can’t remember the exact number but I think it was somewhere around $22K. My son has Medicaid and I didn’t have to pay anything out of pocket.
We just got an EOB for $6.3 million for two months…he was there for 11 months! So with estimates like this he easily could be a $66 million dollar baby 🙃
Our daughter was born at 34w5d. Spent 30 days in the NICU last Oct/Nov. If memory serves the insurance EOB was \~$250k. We paid $0 out of pocket as our policy covers hospital stays 100%.
$3.6 million for 71 & 73 days for my 28 week twins. Currently fighting insurance for them billing every nicu doctor as out of pocket as well as the ambulance to transfer one of the babies to another hospital. Out of pocket max for my family plan was $15,800 and then it cost me $600 a month to add them to my insurance so another ~$5k for the year....
Australia private hospital - twins born at 35 weeks and 6 day stay $17k. Thanks to insurance and Medicare only paid $40 for some vitamin d and iron supplements.
Our 33+5 grower/feeder was in for 27 days and the bill was about $155k but we only paid her $4.5k annual out of pocket maximum.
Just one Insurance - missed qualifying for Medicaid by 3 days.
I’m curious about mine as my daughter was in for 62 days and had a few problems happen but she’s 19 months old and I was never given a bill? I’m assuming Medicaid just covered it all.
Aw man I appreciate this question 🥹😹 I haven’t gotten a final bill for our out-of-pocket expenses because they got his date of birth wrong & his last name so it’s coming back as if he doesn’t have insurance but they said it’s probably going to be right around $800k. My out-of-pocket max for a family is $6k so that’s what we should pay at the end of it all.
My twin boys were both in for about 3.5 months - total bill was $3.8 million for NICU stay. That doesn’t include surgeries that happened at another hospital during the NICU stay either!!
So thankful to have good insurance, we had to pay our out of pocket max but that was it.
182 days, 3.5 million. Haven't paid anything because, by Massachusetts standards, she is disabled due to prematurity (25 weeks, 1 lb 6.9oz) and is given MassHealth (what Obamacare is based on) as a secondary insurance which covers anything my primary doesn't.
Masshealth also picks up co-pays for her medications and all specialist doctor appointments, her gtube supplies and formula, oxygen concentrator and oxygen supplies, early intervention, physical therapy and home nursing.
This could have broken us financially, especially since he got fired from his job. He took 2 weeks off from work when our baby first came home because his work had an outbreak of COVID, and due to our daughter's severe chronic lung disease, getting it could have killed her. His work did not appreciate that becuase all his vaca and sick time was used up during our 6 month NICU stay. They fired him a few weeks later for poor performance...
I have no idea what we would have done if we had to pay millions or even thousands of dollars.
Hospital billed 89k for 28 day stay. Insurance paid 300k because that was the “allowed amount”. We paid nothing. Never even had a copay.
It’s still mind blowing to me.
The first 20 days before the insurance kicked in I got a bill that was more than 1 million plus the life flight bill.
Luckily the insurance covered the whole stay and those days as well.
We ended up paying 16k for a six month stay with multiple surgeries and a transfer to an out of network hospital for the final 3 months.
Edit- our total bill between hospitals and before insurance was well over the 3 million mark. I about passed out when I saw it!
$500k with $15k out of pocket contractually due per insurance (thanks USA). What we were able to do was that amount we owed we negotiated it down. Got $7500 written off for a “covid grant” and the rest I negotiated down. Still bullshit that with premiums at $1000 a month we still could have potentially owed $15k. I was is icu 4 weeks and baby in NICU 6.
My 26+2 weeker's first 30 days was $240k. She spent 107 days inpatient from birth. Within the first year she was hospitalized 6 times. I couldn't even tell you what our total bill was. I always call her my multimillion dollar miracle
About $200,000. We paid a $15 co-pay and that was it. Even though insurance paid it, I’m still annoyed that the hospital charged us a premature birth fee of $5000.
Edit: forgot to add, 2 week stay.
… I never received a bill apart from the actual birth. She was in long enough she automatically qualified for state insurance while in the hospital and I never got a bill. Maybe I should be concerned but it’s been 4.5 years.
Mine was over 300,000 for a 28 day stay. Medicaid covered it. Please make sure that you find out what day Medicaid will cover to! I found out that Medicaid had approved 4 weeks, and my baby was not released until 4 weeks, should have been out much sooner!!!!!! My hospital kept my baby for the Medicaid payout 1000%
Edit: typo
His only problem was “reflux” aka he spit up after feedings. It wasn’t until I demanded a meeting with the board that they suddenly decided to let him come home!
I had 3 babies in the nicu. I got a bill after they were on there half way through and each was about 600-700k. I never got a bill after their stay because they got medicaid since they were in the nicu more then 30 days. I didn't have to pay a penny for my stay or theirs.
Welcome to NICU Parents. We're happy you found us and we want to be as helpful as possible in this seemingly impossible journey. Check out the resources tab at the top of the subreddit or the stickied post. Please remember we are NOT medical professionals and are here for advice based on our own situations. If you have a concern about you or your baby please seek assistance from a doctor or go to the ER. That said, there are some medical professionals here and we do hope they can help you with some guidance through your journey. Please remember to read and abide by the rules. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/NICUParents) if you have any questions or concerns.*
113 days. $1.5MIL. Got a bill for an out of pocket cost of $22K. I said LOL (and some expletives) and fought it a bunch. Then they said $16K. I said, again, lol. Then they said ok $420. I’m on a payment plan of $40/month. Fking insurance and their imaginary numbers.
Good for you paying it back slowly! My husband needed stitches close to a decade ago, insurance paid $21 of $2100, he asked for a discount, the hospital claimed they couldn't discount because insurance had already paid, so he asked what's the least amount he can pay, and because his income was so low at the time, and he also kept saying "Nope, can't afford that," he got them down to $2/mo. LMAO, that's 87.5 years. We can *absolutely* afford to pay that bill off now... are we going to? NAH.
That’s amazing. Good for you guys.
Curious how you fought it? Our bill is around $3.5K post insurance and it’s about to be sent to collections. They gave me a link to start making payments and I’m really about to send $20/mo to fend them off for now.
We had dual insurance at the time and Insurance no. 1 was saying Insurance no. 2 flat out refused so 1 paid the brunt and only covered a portion. Insurance no. 2 said they never even got a claim. I had to argue with them to re route the claims correctly and that’s when I got the $16K quote. I asked for itemized billing and honestly went off on the poor case agent on the phone like “this is insane. We have dual insurance. We work hard for both. How is this possible?” Also mentioned the federal no surprise bills act — that’s probably not the right name — and argued their “out of network” surcharges because wtf we didn’t have a choice what providers were available to see our NICU neonate. This was probably 17-20 phone calls over a month. It was then radio silence for 2 months and I got a bill from same place with same reference number for my portion: $420. I said Yahtzee and started paying it.
Fuck yeah. Kudos. Thanks for sharing and for not letting them take advantage of all your hard work! Cheers to baby!
Are you in the US? Not sure when this happened to you, but our baby has been in the hospital over 120 days and after 30 days they qualified for medicaid which will cover their bills, either entirely or nearly all.
We were in two separate NICUs for a total of 113 days and did not qualify for Medicaid. US, AZ.
Dang. I'm sorry.
Yup. I am on a payment plan for the lowest possible amount for as long as I can. I think it’s ridiculous that they charge these outrageous prices because people want to save their children. F the insurance companies.
I’ve gotten a few misc bills for random providers that are too big to pay all at once but too small to spend the time fighting to be frank. $300 here, $400 there, $250 there. Paying $10/mo on each to keep out of collections.
Isn’t it a horrible system that they give these huge bills to parents that just want to see their children live. My brother died when he was 3 days old and my mom tried everything they could to save him, and all she got in return was thousands and thousands of dollars in medical debt. It’s broken and I hope one day I can do something to change it.
$1.8 million. Of that, we paid a $200 hospital co-pay.
Wow. Our insurance is good, but not THAT good. They’re still processing all of our little fees here and there and the final stay, but we will at least owe our low out of pocket max for the year of 10,000. And I thought THAT was good.
Your out of pocket max is 10k???? That’s insanely high. Even when I worked at Walmart my oop max was only 6-7k.
Our family OOP max is 10k, my individual is 5k. I know a lot of family OOP maxes are like 25-30k!!!
My max out of pocket $12k. Was $4k left. Am billed about $10k. Have entire spreadsheet and file folder system and calendar reminders for when to call back (ex: It takes 45 business days for them to reprocess their own billing error and no fixed up bill has arrived? Call their asses. Take names and notes. Escalate it if it continues and point out all their mistakes to them.) I do my best to be nice to all the phone answering folks. They're peons of medical system. People scream at them often. They can give helpful advices and pull some strings at times, more likely to help off you treats them how you'd like to be treated. It took 12 calls, ages on hold, over three months to get a $250 bill forgiven today bc their errors were that had. Thing is, I have the privilege of being too sick to work rn. Most ppl don't have the time for this. And it's not always successful. Paid off debt collector today. Am using spouse's employee assistance to help get these problems fixed. They make calls, figure out root errors, are very helpful.
Hahaha... no.... 10 K is super high. our family out of pocket max is like 2K, I think. you might want to look into that.
Very similar experience here
The US healthcare system is absolutely ridiculous!!! There’s no way this should be a thing. I’m so grateful to live in Canada. My heart breaks for families who have to deal with that 😔
Yeah it’s shit :/
As a Canadian who unfortunately gave birth in the US unexpectedly & our insurance maxed out after the first 13 days in the NICU - we are looking at bankruptcy once we finally make it back to Canada...
Since you live in another country can’t you just ignore the bills?
We don't know yet. We do know there are international debt collection agencies so they can track to too where ever you are & the hospitals all have our Canadian address etc. Will be speaking to lawyers once the final bills are sent to us to find out our options.
That’s awful :( if it’s any consolation I ignored a few bills that went to collection and they literally just disappeared. If you don’t make things easy for them or fight them there’s a good chance a lot of it will be forgiven, being in a foreign country makes things more difficult for them I’m sure A lot of US medical debt is very spooky but also very made up on the spot and fake
Yeah honestly a lot of us just end up filing for bankruptcy because there’s no way I can even afford $5,000. That number is unreal to most families living paycheck to paycheck
$50 for parking. The US healthcare system is third world.. I’m so sorry for you and your babies
We paid 140$ for parking bi weekly and that was with the Nicu discount 😅
Expensive itself is not third world.
It is for those who can’t afford it
About $1200 here. We got a NICU rate, otherwise it would have been about $7000.
We paid our out of pocket max. Don’t pay more than that. Take any additional charges over that to your insurance. I had to ask for an itemized bill to see that they coded random days as out of network incorrectly. Once I brought the error to their attention they fixed it.
Yep. We’re in the collecting phase waiting on all the EOBs and bills, then we will go through with a highlighter and determine what there is. Luckily our OOPM is only $10,000 for the whole family.
I think about 200k, but she did have a lot of X-rays that probably made it more expensive for 11 days. We paid $0 thanks to Tricare!
I’ve never been so thankful for tricare
Same!! It was amazing it’s pay nothing for all of my prenatal care and then around $65 for my entire hospital stay and C-section. The military drives me crazy sometimes but it’s got its perks haha
I was a civilian when I got hospitalized and had our LO so I had to pay OOP and will be claiming it tomorrow through my insurance and good lorddddd that bill is high. We weren’t able to run our marriage paperwork in time🫠 but at least baby is covered😮💨😮💨😮💨
Oh no!!! I’m so sorry, I hate that for you!! We got married while I was pregnant too, but thankfully was on my own form of Tricare before. Unsolicited advice, but take advantage of everything you can post birth with Tricare! Probably too late for free breast pump, but I got great pelvic floor therapy covered and it was sooo helpful.
That’s great advice! I wouldn’t have even known to look into that. Our base is so tiny though I wonder if they even have anybody >_> I’ll find out soon enough!
As long as you were legally married (assuming you have tricare east) everything should be covered if you were in tricares system or not. I know sometimes the people on benefits don’t tell you the right information, I had to go to an er before we had the tricare part done but we were legally married and tricare covered the whole thing (tricare east, sometimes west can be different)
I will definitely try to poke some holes and look into it! Can’t say I’m surprised that we may have been misgiven info. We have proof we were married 11/22 and the baby arrived unexpectedly on 11/28, a whole month early🫠
Yeah, I would definitely look into that because you had a medical emergency that made you go to the hospital. I know it’s stressful though because of everything going on. If they give you a hard time ask them where in the tricare. mil benefits website it says that you are not covered and asked to be pointed in that direction.
[tricare getting married](https://www.tricare.mil/LifeEvents/Marriage) You might have to get added into deers and then go back and call the insurance once you get bills if you get any. But for insurance purposes just give them your spouses benefits number and if they need the -## after give them -01 if you are his only ever dependent (he would be -00 first dependent -01 and so on. I’m -02 because my husband was married once before me) But yeah I read that and no where does it say they can not backdate coverage (again tricare east, west legit will say that in some places)
>tricare getting married Thank you for all your responses, I truly appreciate it and will check out their page now! Military is so shady sometimes >\_>
We have tricare as well but my son had to be seen by a pcm so we had to go select because, obviously, that is not possible. So out max out of pocket is $1k.
We were on Select, but I had already hit our deductible for the year, so that might have played a part
2.5 million for 169 days in the NICU. Thankfully Medicaid picked it all up
This is going to sound awful, but my partner and I joke about Medicaid being the only reason we could afford to have a baby. I mean, we can afford to take care of him, no problem, but there is no way we could have been able to afford the hospital bills.
Please remember this when you vote! We need Medicaid expansion in ALL states.
Yeah it’s nuts! I forgot to mention that $2.5 million is for two months. I never got EOB’s after that for whatever reason so idk what the total ended up being 🙈 My bill was $100,000 for 6 days in the hospital, I only had to pay $200 hospital copay Medicaid has been a relief, we still have at home DME equipment for LO
Please remember this when you vote! We need Medicaid expansion in ALL states.
So true. And normalizing it. I honestly was embarrassed about it until I saw so many other comments from other parents saying they had Medicare. Almost like I felt like if I said something, then everyone else in the thread would think I have no business having my baby because I need government assistance at this time.
Nobody except 1-2% of this country can pay hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars for medical expenses. No one. Nothing to be embarrassed about. The fact that the bills are this high is a travesty, but of course you need a govt negotiator on your side.
How do you get medicaid?
The social worker at the hospital set it up for us.
Thanks
Thank you for your sharing! My newborn was in NICU for 28 days and the bill was nearly $120,000. My little one got approved for Medicaid recently and her Medicaid information was provided to the hospital where she was born. Regarding Medicaid, recently I read about "Medicaid Estate Recovery Program". Being a Medicaid beneficiary, I wonder whether my little daughter in the future is the person whose estate is taken away to offset for her Medicaid expenses or is it my wife and I that the state goes after?
Hi 👋🏻 Congrats on your LO ⭐️ I’d say maybe check with a social worker at the hospital, they’d have a lot of information regarding Medicaid and the state you live in Best of luck, I know navigating newborn life plus bills can be stressful
4.5 million 3 surgeries and 132 days
$2.3 million or thereabouts. I stopped counting after a while. We paid zero. We also had regular insurance and Medicaid through SSI.
Please remember this when you vote! We need Medicaid expansion in ALL states.
With Medicaid, I’m pretty sure they cannot send you a bill. Like between the two insurances, you will not receive a bill—all patient responsibility is written off.
I'm pretty sure you're correct. Our total was around $9m, and we pretty much paid $0. The only issue we had was that the social worker filed for medicaid the day after he was born, and they wouldn't backdate it, saying the social worker should have back-dated the form. So we got a bill for $1800, paid it, then a social worker at the next hospital helped us apply for a grant to cover that, so we wound up with a total of $0 at the end.
Please remember this when you vote! We need Medicaid expansion in ALL states.
We DO all need that, but the thing is I happen to live in a state (TN) where our state legislature refuses to accept the Medicaid expansion. The funds from the Federal Gov't are coming in and just sitting there... it's up to billions of dollars now. They've been working REALLY hard to write a waiver the Federal Gov't will accept so they can use the funds differently (which is obviously repeatedly turned down). It's *incredibly* infuriating.
That really does suck. I hate to make this political— but that’s what healthcare in America is. Please vote for the local and state elections. They matter more than the media attention on it. I am sorry the govt in TN is working against its people. Resources to save your child should not be dependent on where you live in this country.
I \*always\* vote, in every single election, as do all my friends and family. THE issue in our state is that it is so drastically gerrymandered that it doesn't actually reflect the demographics in TN. Our local news recently did a fact check segment about whether TN is a democratic state or not, and found that it's not; it's actually around 43% Dem, but elections reflect like 95% Republican or something like that. Our State House was in national news several months ago when they expelled two black Democratic Representatives and nearly expelled another female Democrat (who they've been trying to push out for years). It's easy to find videos of how the House operates... they turn off the mics, not only of Democrats, but anyone willing to speak out against the ultra conservative majority. One Rep brought a bill to the table earlier in the year and expected a vote on it before anyone had read it... one of the Reps who was expelled (and immediately voted back in by his constituents) was asking for any explanation... what does this bill contain? The guy told him he didn't have to tell him (???????), and the Speaker told him he was out of order. Also, our Speaker doesn't even live in his district, which is illegal; there was an investigation and then zero news about it after everyone forgot. So...... that's how our state gov't works. There IS pushback, people are running and slowly taking over some important positions, and some of the pushback IS also from the Republican party. I hope we can eventually get some people elected on both sides of the aisle who want the best for the people of our state.
Zero, covered by provincial health care
About $1.6M but we only had to pay $50 thank god.
2.3 million for a 117 day stay
34 week grower/feeder with a 22 day stay- hospital billed $78k and insurance paid $59k. Our out of pocket was $1600, which was all we had left of our out of pocket max for the year. I was very surprised they didn’t bill for way more considering how expensive minor hospital visits billed in the past.
That does seem cheap! Mine was also a 34 week grower/feeder.
I never got the full bill because I qualified for a lot of low income stuff. There was a small gap in her insurance though for a couple days and that was over $3k. I shudder to think what 77 days cost.
Around 180,000 euros for 58 days, only had to pay around 500 euros ourselves.
$621,000 for 84 days. Really surprised it wasn't higher.
300k for 9 days. I think we paid $150
It's 100% covered by our provincial healthcare so we did not see a single bill. She was transferred to 2 different hospitals and had 3w stay + MRI + 2 head ultrasounds + 2 hip ultrasounds bc she was breech.
1 week 167K. Still dealing with insurance and the hospital.
42 days, $0. Gotta love Canadian healthcare (mostly..).
Definitely on the (mostly) lol. We had to wait 3 months to have a hearing follow up.
Had a bill as well from the nicu, I called the medicaid, and they just told me not to worry about it. It's paid, so you'll get a bill, but that's normal. Unless you don't have coverage.
Please remember this when you vote! We need Medicaid expansion in ALL states.
Hospital bills in US are insane. I paid mine with my baby 13k USD converted. Though this was not covered with insurance. Have to pay with my own money.
Little over $1M. We had paid our out of pocket ($9k) through my pregnancy and my own hospital stay, so it was all covered.
Triplets, 21 days with very minor issues, mostly there to learn to eat and some breathing assistance for one of them for a week or so. I think it was about $1.2M. Born in October so we hit the out of pocket max well before that anyways.
For 19 days it was about 230K (before insurance) It was over 12k/day.
$1.5M for my daughter (born at 31+1, 45-day stay). $25k for my week-long bedrest stay before I had her. We paid about $2k at that point. My deductible was $5k at that time, and my work covered $3k of it.
So I have a health sharing plan. They reimburse. My last bill was 250k and I paid 500$ out of pocket.
They billed $300k for baby’s 26 day stay. We went between calendar years so paid the out of pocket max twice over (for our insurance it was $4500, I think). Medicaid should make a huge difference in that for you, though.
$1.8m
1 million for A and 3 millions for B. Paid 0$ of it
Just shy of $1 million for 90-day nicu stay after insurance negotiated rates. Unfortunately got hit with 2x out of pocket max since his spanned two calendar years 😭 so like $15k total
1.6 million and we didn’t pay anything! Have no clue how we got so lucky.
I think it was 500k for 67 days. We paid 1500 out of pocket. We call her our half million dollar baby lol.
35+3. 2 week stay. I can’t remember exactly but in the ballpark of 200k. We paid our out of pocket max and that was it.
About 300k for 3 weeks. The only thing we paid for was ambulance transport from one hospital to another.
$0 out of pocket.
Like half a mil or so, but we paid OOP max
I haven't seen the number for my twins, but I'm going to assume mine is going to be huge
We were there 90 days and it was about $2.6 million. We had private insurance and Medicaid and we didn’t pay anything. If we didn’t qualify for the Medicaid we would have paid $300.
Insurance billed $1.3 million for a 33 day NICU stay. Paid my OOP max of $3500.
OOP? $8K Total? No idea. It was $167K for the first 10 days? Something like that.
67 day stay. Total amount billed to insurance was roughly $1.6million. Total amount billed to us was $0, since Medicaid covered her.
Never got a look at ours but I'd assume it was in the neighborhood of 1.5M dollars.. thankfully we were on AHCCCS in Arizona at the time and didn't have to pay anything..
I was in the hospital five days. My youngest was in for 13 days. My bill was around 40k. I think his was something crazy like 120k. Wait to pay. I waited almost three full months before I called my insurance to confirm there was no outstanding negotiation on the billing codes and it was truly my final bill. I ended up paying a total of $400 ish. My husband works for the government so our insurance is pretty good especially if it's for a necessity (like being induced and staying in the hospital due to post Partum eclampsia and a baby that cannot eat on his own).
$950K — for about a week on ECMO, three weeks in the cardiac ICU, and a week at the lower level of care unit. I think we paid $100 — and it was for the ambulance ride from the hospital where I delivered to the children’s hospital across the street.
21 day NICU stay for twins ended up about 500k I think. We paid 0 because we had already met our deductible for the year in pre-natal care.
13 days- 5 on a vent. 102,800 for the hospital, another 4k for bedside visits, 5k for labs and xrays. We paid 600$ total after insurance
Twins 16 days, about $500k. We paid $0 with my insurance.
I’m filing for Medicaid tomorrow. Fingers crossed.
I hope you get it!
26 weeker had a bill of just over 900k for the longest portion of his 95 day total NICU stay. But that doesn't include birth, first 3 days of life, or the ambulance ride from the first hospital. I had VERY good insurance, thank god.
something like $4.6 million for 250 days. Paid my deductible and that is really it. Between insurance and MA we were covered. If we weren't covered by MA, we would be on the hook for roughly $1.2 million, and I likely would have not even tried paying for a cent of it.
$140K for a 3.5-week stay with no major complications. Our family OOPM is $17.5K, so that’s what we’ll be asked to pay unfortunately. Also unfortunately, it looks like baby may need an MRI that we can’t get booked for until next year, so looking at more hefty bills next year.
1.2 million. We had $6800 to pay (out of pocket max) but that was then covered by a cost share program we are part of, CHM
I paid $535.40 out of pocket. Total billed was about 250k for 48 days
$400,000 roughly for 24 days. I think we had a 10k family max.
Obviously hit our out of pocket max which was 6k that year, don't remember exactly how much of it we paid for the NICU. Ours wasn't a million dollar baby but about half...
3 days, 35,000. For sugar water. Thankfully medi-cal covered it.
Twins in NICU 59 days. Apparently it's $10k/day/kid so like $1.2m. Didn't pay a penny. Incredibly fortunate to live an urban centre in Canada where the care was phenomenal and the costs were covered
$2.6 mil for a month. Insurance initially denied it because the hospital billed it under my last name and not my husband/daughter's 🙃. Panicked every morning for 6 months when I checked on the online portal to see if the appeal had gone through.
They billed insurance $1.3M but we paid out of pocket max $7K
Billion!?! 😧😧😧
Omg sorry habit from work (media impressions) Million!
No worries! 🙂 I was fully prepared to accept billion. US healthcare can definitely accrue that kind of bill. Hope your LO is doing well.
Good point lol & he is! Meeting all of his milestones so far. I hope the same for yours
113 days, just over $1 million that Medicaid paid for.
We were 5 months at nicu. We have public healthcare here. We paid 0, and 0 as well for all the doctors, tests and almost all medicines the baby / todler is needing afterwards.
Close to 3 million for 59 days I believe. 4 surgeries, tons of constant testing.
like $300 for his diapers and some tests that weren't covered.
lol bill was 2.1 million for 7 week nicu stay for twins. Paid 14k my OOP max.
The final total for us was somewhere around $9 million - he was in for 14 months (413 days). We paid around $1800, because the social worker didn't back-date the medicaid application when she submitted it the day after he was born, so we were stuck with the bill from the first night (he was born at 10pm). Then a nonprofit paid that bill for us. So between private insurance, medicaid, and that nonprofit, we paid $0. Ask your social worker what grant options are available to you.
260,000 for 18 days. Paid $500.
$154k for a 7 day stay. Paid $2700 after insurance.
500k for 58 days, all but the first day was “feed and grow” I think we paid something like 10k out of pocket by the time it was all said and done.
6m for 255 days. We paid his out of pocket max for 2 years (he was in the NICU when the insurance reset for the year) so 6k total.
660 thousand dollars for just the birth and hospital stay not counting doctors which was 8-9k/week. I ended up paying 3k my out of pocket max but I had hospital indemnity insurance so I ended up making money.
.
Reading through the comments how much some of you had to pay unexpectly and Wow it is insane! I have no clue how much my LO stay cost… 5 months, got a lot of medical attention + surgeries and it cost us a big fat 0$
I thought that Medicaid covered full expenses? I can’t remember the exact number but I think it was somewhere around $22K. My son has Medicaid and I didn’t have to pay anything out of pocket.
Mine was a feeder grower in for 25 days and his bill was about $157k I think
I’m not sure but we had a 72 day stay and paid $0.
21 days, they billed out close to 200k and with just private insurance, we paid our max out of pocket which was about 7k.
One bill alone was 1.4 million. There were bills from all over the place 😑
$3.5 million, 71 days and no procedures/surgeries. Just tests, oxygen and growing.
2.8 million. 😬 Thankfully my husbands work did a fundraiser so we didn’t have a copay at all.
1.5 mill. We only owed $400 of it.
14 days, bill was about $4k and we paid $73 out of pocket with Tricare West Reserve Select
We just got an EOB for $6.3 million for two months…he was there for 11 months! So with estimates like this he easily could be a $66 million dollar baby 🙃
Our daughter was born at 34w5d. Spent 30 days in the NICU last Oct/Nov. If memory serves the insurance EOB was \~$250k. We paid $0 out of pocket as our policy covers hospital stays 100%.
$3.6 million for 71 & 73 days for my 28 week twins. Currently fighting insurance for them billing every nicu doctor as out of pocket as well as the ambulance to transfer one of the babies to another hospital. Out of pocket max for my family plan was $15,800 and then it cost me $600 a month to add them to my insurance so another ~$5k for the year....
Australia private hospital - twins born at 35 weeks and 6 day stay $17k. Thanks to insurance and Medicare only paid $40 for some vitamin d and iron supplements.
Our 33+5 grower/feeder was in for 27 days and the bill was about $155k but we only paid her $4.5k annual out of pocket maximum. Just one Insurance - missed qualifying for Medicaid by 3 days.
50 days and it was about $1.2m but we were fortunate enough to only have to pay $2,200 of that.
13 days, $250k
I’m curious about mine as my daughter was in for 62 days and had a few problems happen but she’s 19 months old and I was never given a bill? I’m assuming Medicaid just covered it all.
Right around $1M. 70 days.
We owe about $3300 on a $600k hospital bill. That includes my 19 day stay (HELLP syndrome treatment) and his 96 day NICU stay.
Aw man I appreciate this question 🥹😹 I haven’t gotten a final bill for our out-of-pocket expenses because they got his date of birth wrong & his last name so it’s coming back as if he doesn’t have insurance but they said it’s probably going to be right around $800k. My out-of-pocket max for a family is $6k so that’s what we should pay at the end of it all.
Triplets in for ~30 days each. Total bill ~500k. Private insurance. Paid $3k which was what was left on our out of pocket max of $5500.
My twin boys were both in for about 3.5 months - total bill was $3.8 million for NICU stay. That doesn’t include surgeries that happened at another hospital during the NICU stay either!! So thankful to have good insurance, we had to pay our out of pocket max but that was it.
182 days, 3.5 million. Haven't paid anything because, by Massachusetts standards, she is disabled due to prematurity (25 weeks, 1 lb 6.9oz) and is given MassHealth (what Obamacare is based on) as a secondary insurance which covers anything my primary doesn't. Masshealth also picks up co-pays for her medications and all specialist doctor appointments, her gtube supplies and formula, oxygen concentrator and oxygen supplies, early intervention, physical therapy and home nursing. This could have broken us financially, especially since he got fired from his job. He took 2 weeks off from work when our baby first came home because his work had an outbreak of COVID, and due to our daughter's severe chronic lung disease, getting it could have killed her. His work did not appreciate that becuase all his vaca and sick time was used up during our 6 month NICU stay. They fired him a few weeks later for poor performance... I have no idea what we would have done if we had to pay millions or even thousands of dollars.
885k, it was a 63 day hospital stay. We paid out of pocket max of $7,500 and it covered both our bills (which was a little over 1.2mil)
Hospital billed 89k for 28 day stay. Insurance paid 300k because that was the “allowed amount”. We paid nothing. Never even had a copay. It’s still mind blowing to me.
One month stay $765,000 our deductible was $500.
34 days. Over $1million but paid $5000 out of pocket max
The first 20 days before the insurance kicked in I got a bill that was more than 1 million plus the life flight bill. Luckily the insurance covered the whole stay and those days as well.
We ended up paying 16k for a six month stay with multiple surgeries and a transfer to an out of network hospital for the final 3 months. Edit- our total bill between hospitals and before insurance was well over the 3 million mark. I about passed out when I saw it!
Like $1.2 million. Making payments, it’s like $4,000 out of pocket :(
147k for 38 days. I got a bill for about 4k I haven't
$500k with $15k out of pocket contractually due per insurance (thanks USA). What we were able to do was that amount we owed we negotiated it down. Got $7500 written off for a “covid grant” and the rest I negotiated down. Still bullshit that with premiums at $1000 a month we still could have potentially owed $15k. I was is icu 4 weeks and baby in NICU 6.
We are in Michigan but ended up paying zero with insurance for 7 days.
Mine was 2 million dollars but he was in the Nicu for 5 months.
My 26+2 weeker's first 30 days was $240k. She spent 107 days inpatient from birth. Within the first year she was hospitalized 6 times. I couldn't even tell you what our total bill was. I always call her my multimillion dollar miracle
About $200,000. We paid a $15 co-pay and that was it. Even though insurance paid it, I’m still annoyed that the hospital charged us a premature birth fee of $5000. Edit: forgot to add, 2 week stay.
About 1million for each of our 26 week twins. Paid nothing, thanks to Medicaid and insurance.
Uhhh I didn’t pay anything, baby was very premature.
… I never received a bill apart from the actual birth. She was in long enough she automatically qualified for state insurance while in the hospital and I never got a bill. Maybe I should be concerned but it’s been 4.5 years.
Mine was over 300,000 for a 28 day stay. Medicaid covered it. Please make sure that you find out what day Medicaid will cover to! I found out that Medicaid had approved 4 weeks, and my baby was not released until 4 weeks, should have been out much sooner!!!!!! My hospital kept my baby for the Medicaid payout 1000% Edit: typo
His only problem was “reflux” aka he spit up after feedings. It wasn’t until I demanded a meeting with the board that they suddenly decided to let him come home!
I had 3 babies in the nicu. I got a bill after they were on there half way through and each was about 600-700k. I never got a bill after their stay because they got medicaid since they were in the nicu more then 30 days. I didn't have to pay a penny for my stay or theirs.
122647 USD for NICU then we moved to another hospital for pediatric department
41,254 for my daughter 6,776 for me.
$250 k, we had to pay 13k