{"id":21347,"date":"2022-01-14T14:30:12","date_gmt":"2022-01-14T14:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/?p=21347"},"modified":"2022-01-14T19:32:31","modified_gmt":"2022-01-14T19:32:31","slug":"reason-to-celebrate-no-more-surprise-medical-bills-in-the-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/surprise_medical_bill_victory\/","title":{"rendered":"Reason to celebrate: No more surprise medical bills in the new year!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"By NCL Director of Health Policy Jeanette Contreras<\/strong><\/p>\n

Consumers have grown to expect surprise medical bills as a given in the fragmented U.S. healthcare system. Even people with large employer-sponsored health insurance coverage could expect to receive a surprise bill for an out-of-network medical service. A 2021 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services<\/a> outlined how more than half of U.S. consumers reported recently receiving an unexpected medical bill \u2014 many related to essential services like childbirth, elective surgeries, or emergency services. Thanks to the No Surprises Act, signed into law as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, surprise medical bills will be a thing of the past.<\/p>\n

Beginning January 1, 2022, federal protections ban surprise medical bills any time a person receives emergency care, including some non-emergency services. For example, the new law bans out-of-network charges for out-of-network providers who work at an in-network facility. It also requires that cost-sharing for emergency services, like co-pays and co-insurance, be based on in-network rates.<\/p>\n

Healthcare providers and facilities will be required to give patients easy-to-understand notice regarding out-of-network care, explaining that it could be more expensive. Providers will also need to tell patients whom to contact if they think the provider or facility has violated the surprise billing protections. Patients will be able to dispute a claim if they receive a medical bill that is higher than the estimated cost given in advance of care.<\/p>\n

Whether or not a patient has insurance, they can submit a complaint about a medical billing issue if they have a question or are concerned that their provider may not be following the new rules. For more help, consumers can go to the CMS.gov webpage to submit a claim online<\/a> or call the No Surprises Help Desk at 1-800-985-3059, 8am-8pm ET seven days a week; (TTY: 800-985-3059).<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

More than half of U.S. consumers reported recently receiving an unexpected medical bill. The No Surprises Act will help.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14415,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false},"categories":[416,16,288],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21347"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21347"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21351,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21347\/revisions\/21351"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nclnet.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}