Health billing indecipherable

Please tell me how we can fight Medicare fraud when hospital and doctor bills are written in code.

I have successfully fought cancer in the last few years. I have very good insurance. However, trying to decode and understand the medical bills is virtually impossible.

Bills often arrive months, even years after the procedure. There is a date, perhaps a doctor’s name. Often the doctor is one I have never heard of. Is this a consultant? A radiologist? I check my old calendars to verify the date. Yes, I had an appointment that day, but what was the procedure?

Today I received a bill from RADial (Who are they?) for a procedure on Sept. 24, 2008. A Blue Cross payment was made July 6, 2009, 10 months after the alleged procedure, a Medicare payment on July 21, 2009, a Medicare adjustment on Dec. 14, 2009, and my payment is due on Dec. 15, 2009.

This is typical of a multitude of bills I have dealt with over the last few years. I am now healthy, the bills paid, I think. Please, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, consider this when you seem to think that our health care system is just fine.

Nancy Barker

Spokane