When Hospitals Profit and Patients Pay

In September of 2022, Ben Los’s 5-year-old son began experiencing seizures. After rushing him to the doctor Ben and his wife were referred to a specialist within their insurance network, just an hour and a half away from their Colorado Springs home. They got the EEG scan for their son and were in and out of the specialist’s office in 45 minutes where they were assured, “yes, absolutely it is covered.”

Flash forward to two months later in November when the Los family received a bill for $2,518 for the appointment. After calling the hospital to find out why they were being charged for something they confirmed multiple times was covered, the hospital claimed this was for “facility fees.” The appointment itself was covered, but now the hospital was defending the charge stating, “Well, you paid the clinic staff, but now you also have to pay the hospital,” even using lines like, “Do you think that the hospital staff that helped get your son the treatment that he needed don’t deserve to be paid?”

Ben was enraged and did everything in his power to get to the bottom of this. Eventually, he was able to speak to somebody near the top of Presbyterian St. Luke’s Administration who was able to negotiate the bill down to a 75% reduction, which they classified as charity. He was simultaneously able to engage with an investigative journalist in Denver found who out that Presbyterian St. Luke’s is owned by a company, which is owned by a company, and so on. When they finally found the owners two or three levels up, they discovered profited billions in the first nine months of 2022 alone.

“You can’t tell me that there is no way for the hospitals to pay their employees when they’re raking in the kinds of net profits that they’re claiming every single year,” said Los.