so i decided to go to urgent care yesterday, after seeing @heartlessviking’s post. it was right next to the dermatology place so i figured it was convenient. and like heartlessviking, time would have been better spent doing ANYTHING else. JFC, “healthcare” in America is so shit. It’s bottom of the barrel shit.
So apparently they don’t do much aside from dealing with colds and flu’s and shit, despite their website claiming they can do SO much, and listing a bunch of useful shit. And even with cold’s and flu’s, to get the basic standard labs to find out whether what you have- they tell you that they can’t tell you if it’s covered by insurance, even though the urgent care takes my insurance.
I’m like WTF? If they take my insurance, WHY would I still possibly wind up with a bill? I’ve gone to urgent care before. I gone to lots of places- many of those places outright tell you before you start any service if you’re covered or if you’re going to wind up with a bill. That was standard in the state I used to live in. Almost everything was covered, and if things weren’t, they’d tell you in advance you’re going to be billed, so you can choose to continue or not if you don’t want to be billed.
Then I moved to another state, and literally EVERY place in that state “couldn’t tell you if you’re covered,” even though they take your insurance. and when you ask them how much it’ll be, they can’t tell you how much it’ll be, even if you call BILLING. And I don’t mean their bullshit prices that vary depending on which insurance you have. I mean when you call and ask for their price BEFORE insurance. They can’t even tell you THAT. Like how does billing NOT know how much their cost for each procedure is before insurance? It’s the biggest fucking scam there is.
Anyhow, I’m currently in another another state where I’ve been to dermatology office and they flat out told me I will not have any charges, and then I go to the urgent care, and they tell me “we can’t tell you if a regular visit (consult) is covered, despite them taking my insurance. I get certain uncommon things might not be covered but why wouldn’t a BASIC OFFICE VISIT *not* be covered by insurance if you say you take my insurance.
SO I wind up not getting ANY fucking labs done, bc b!tch told me I could be charged up to $280 for the basic standard cold/flu labs. And she didn’t mention the price for a basic consult, a regular office visit, which I may or may not be charged for- for the lady telling me NOTHING of value. Hell, ***** didn’t even prescribe me cough stuff or decongestants or anything. Like that Dr was abso-fucking-lutely USELESS. And I better not be charged ANYTHING for that fucking useless visit.
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WOW- did a google search for CityMD and Medicare and THIS is what comes up- this is 2018 Manhattan U.S. Attorney Announces $6.6 Million Settlement Against CityMD For Submitting False Claims To Medicare
What a shit place. If anyone has CityMD- DO NOT go to them. What a bunch of scammers.
UGH, I have a feeling they’re going to charge me for that basic visit… -_-
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SO according to another site, it says a single basic visit costs $225-$250 cash.
1- That’s fucking bullshit for 1 fucking visit
2- Funny how CityMD’s own fucking website won’t tell you their cash price and you have to find it somewhere else.
JFC I really don’t want to pay $200. Something tells me I’m going to wind up owing money to this shit place for this shit visit.
3 comments
Well I apologize if I gave you hope in urgentcare. They serve a purpose, and that’s it. Nothing else, the low expectation that if you need a doctors note, they can do it. They’ll be exactly as useful as your average ER visit.
Because that whole business of being helpful, that’s how all businesses present themselves. That’s the sales pitch. In the US, it’s allowed to be almost entirely lies and fluff.
I have run into helpful urgentcare, but there isn’t any formula to it. You have to go in the same as always, expecting very little, and sometimes they exceed expectations.
It’s also weirdly helpful to be ex healthcare, going into that. Not that I recommend a career in healthcare, just that having had one is useful because you can tell when a nurse is lying or not. Tons of bad nurses out there, but most of them just work for terrible people.
I also long for the healthcare of almost any other country. France, to pick one. If you call an ambulance in France, they do everything they can to look after your health. I don’t have faith that it’s perfect, it’s still people doing medicine, but there isn’t the endemic corruption ever present in the profit motive system.
and what’s more, the French system will go out of it’s way to see that you go to the doctor regularly, that you get preventative medicine so that you don’t end up sick enough to need an ambulance.
but we don’t have that. We have to take comfort that at least the majority of our species has been smart enough not to opt for our backwards system of healthcare. Humanity will march on, but individually the outlook is less optimistic.
no it’s not your fault. had i not finally felt better after hacking up that giant phlegm, and was feeling “good” enough to go outside, i decided to look up urgent care and saw it was literally a few doors down from my shitty derm’s office, so i went.
i went there thinking they’d at least do my labs and i’d find out wtf I had. but they couldn’t even do that. and now i’m on the hook for up to $250 for that shitty useless visit
i’ve just been in-patient at a hospital. hell, this was one of the BETTER hospitals too (rated 3.6 vs 2.5 online like all the other hospitals), and the care is such shit. i really need to leave the fucking country before i get sick and old, bc if you’re too sick to take care of yourself and are forced to be in hospitals or old ppl’s homes, you are fucked. the care is SO bad. like they’ll literally let you stew in your own piss and poo for hours b4 the nurses comes to change you. or when your IV is done, they don’t take it out for hours, so you’re left unable to move around bc you’re still hooked to the fucking IV. and when you need to pee, god forbid you use the bathrooms bc they’re dirty af , and you most certainly will catch an infection.