Insurance Plans

 The federal No Surprises Act became effective Jan. 1, 2022. The law aims to help patients understand health care costs in advance of care and to minimize unforeseen — or surprise — medical bills. 

Self-pay patients have a right to receive a good faith estimate ahead of scheduled nonemergency health care services. A good faith estimate shows the cost of items and services that are reasonably expected for your health care needs. The estimate is based on information known at the time the estimate was created, and can include costs related to your visit but does not include the cost of medical tests and prescription medications or supplements. 

Provider fee schedules vary. Those fee schedules are noted in your intake paperwork.

 The No Surprises Act will reduce instances where patients face unexpected medical bills due to receiving care from an out-of-network facility or provider during an emergency. Similarly, patients are protected from receiving surprise bills for certain scheduled services for which they could not reasonably know the network status of a provider. For certain scheduled care with out-of-network providers, patients must be given appropriate notice and give approval, where applicable, to be billed for any applicable out-of-network fee or amount.