Surgical Assistant's Presence During Knee Repair Leads to a Costly Surprise Bill

It's getting where you need your lawyer involved with the hospital administration to negotiate terms before surgery, such as: no out of network procedures, no out of network diagnostics, no out of network pharmaceuticals, and no out of network staff, 3rd parties, or professionals of any kind involved . . .

I had ObamaCare 2 years ago, urologist diagnosed me with double hernias (old age, not injury).

I was referred to surgeon who was "in network", we set up hospital to be "in network".

A close friend explained in more detail the hazards:

You have to call and determine if EVERYONE who might be involved is in "in network".

Turned out the anesthesiologists had a mafia grip on that particular hospital and they were not in network.

I called and had everything shut down and rescheduled for another better hospital whom had an anesthesiologists group that also had a mafia grip on their hospital - - - but they were in network.

In the end I legally obtained ~$55,000 worth of hernia surgery for about $450 in copay.