Following the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson by a masked gunman in Midtown Manhattan, people all over the internet have started sharing their stories with denied health insurance claims, and the numerous tales are quite heartbreaking.
Many shared their stories online regarding their encounters with the American healthcare system, and these are just 15 of those heartbreaking stories.
A cancer patient passed before treatment
One anonymous user shared that their partner had liver cancer and had been qualified for claiming treatment insurance but that “insurance started dragging their feet asking impossible questions” until he got sicker.
They said, “The emergency room doctor said he sees this all the time. The insurance companies start dragging their feet so the person will get sicker and no longer qualify for the clinical trial.”
A person with diabetes had to pay out of pocket
After being told by their doctor they needed to start insulin, a user found out their insurance company denied covering it, “When I called to find out what was wrong, they told me it was not medically necessary.”
They had to “pay $800 per month out of pocket” for their medication.
One person got billed $100K
Writing about their postpartum experience, one user anonymously said, “My doctor was in-network, the hospital I delivered at was in-network, but the NICU in the same hospital was NOT in-network.”
“Our babies spent a week in the NICU, and we got a bill for $100,000 for their one-week stay. Fought the insurance for almost a year to get it covered,” they wrote.
A parent had to use all their inheritance to treat their kid
An anonymous parent wrote that in an attempt to get their 20-year-old daughter into an in-patient facility to treat her addiction to opioids, the insurance claim was denied.
“Insurance said they would only pay for 30 days of outpatient treatment,” they wrote before sharing they had to use the last $60K they had of inheritance to treat her.
Another parent is struggling to treat their child
One person wrote that their autistic daughter had to try out several medications for a long time before finding the right one which had been covered by their insurance, but not for long.
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“Last week, we found out that at the start of next year, her medication will no longer be covered. I cannot believe they can legally do this!!” they wrote.
An angry user spoke about the prices of cancer meds
A person who has more than one relative suffering from cancer wrote, “My mother’s cancer meds cost her $6k/month out of pocket. Insurance is paying about $30k, but the fact that she’s bearing a $72k/year cost for lifesaving meds is absolutely f***ing wild.”
One person’s daughter was denied a wheelchair
An anonymous parent wrote that their daughter has cerebral palsy and could barely walk but was denied a wheelchair, “She wears leg orthotics and can’t walk long distances. She tires easily and then falls.”
They have to rent wheelchairs if they want to go anywhere that requires a lot of walking like museums or zoos.
A claim was denied after having been pre-approved
An anonymous user wrote they had pre-approval from their insurance company before their husband’s hernia surgery but were charged anyway before they called the company.
“The person on the phone said that it was a usual practice to deny every third or fourth claim for no reason, and the company kept the money,” the user claimed.
A person with MS was told it wasn’t bad enough
After being told they needed to switch medication for their MS “where your immune system basically takes nibbles out of your brain and spinal cord,” a user wrote that insurance denied their claim for the new drug.
“The reason to switch wasn’t deemed bad enough because there were no new lesions (scars left by the nibbles),” they wrote.
Another tragic encounter with cancer
Another anonymous user shared their husband’s experience with cancer where he was denied a PET scan twice, “The first denial claimed it was because he hadn’t had a liver biopsy yet, which he had. The second denial claimed it was because PET scans hadn’t proven their efficacy.”
They said he passed away six months after being diagnosed.
Insurance told another patient their treatment wasn’t necessary
“I was denied a prophylactic mastectomy and reconstruction. I had thyroid cancer, my mom had breast cancer, and I have a genetic mutation also putting me at higher risk,” an anonymous user wrote.
“My oncologist estimated my risk factor to be over 70% for developing breast cancer. Insurance said it wasn’t medically necessary,” they shared.
One person was denied a prosthetic
A user wrote that their husband was denied a new prosthetic which he needed because of changes in his stump as he is a below-knee amputee.
“He was denied as the insurance company said it was not medically necessary. Apparently, they thought he should hop everywhere?” the user wrote.
Claim denial made a person become an addict
The anonymous user wrote that after being stabilized by lyrica post-surgery at 17, the insurance said they wouldn’t cover it.
“I developed a dependency and became an addict as a high schooler. I stood no chance, in part because they would refuse to cover anything other than narcotics for the next six years until the opioid crisis took off in the news,” they shared.
Someone was dropped after open heart surgery
One person shared that they had gotten dropped by their insurance company after needing open heart surgery following five heart attacks.
“I had to wait a couple of years without having any insurance because I had a pre-existing condition, and no insurance company would extend health insurance to me,” they wrote.
Insurance denied a person’s claim for stroke treatment
A frustrated anonymous user wrote that their insurance company denied their claim for a hospital stay after having had a stroke “because they said it wasn’t ‘medically necessary.’”
These medical insurance horror stories only leave you wondering when things will get better.
