In 2012 I wrote a post about Lankenau Hospital and Main Line Health’s screwed up business practices. when it came to billing.
Today I am writing again.
This is what I sent to Lankenau today.
If I had to do it all over again, as much as I love Dr. Marisa Weiss I would have chosen to go elsewhere because of your sucky business practices when it comes to patient billing.
When I began as a patient three years ago I filled out reams of paperwork. And I kept asking for bills as week after week of radiation treatment went by. I was told not to worry I would get billed. Only I never got any bills. But I kept asking and they kept giving me the same answer.
More than a year later I find out because of my then mail man that you all were mailing invoices to my dead father’s FORMER address. A property my parents had not owned in over a decade at that point, and I might add an address I never provided to you because I wasn’t a patient of yours before. I always use Penn Medicine.
So I called and I went through rigmarole and finally ended up on a payment plan. I was paying you until April 25, 2014 when my invoices stopped coming.
I made two attempts by telephone to get my invoices straightened out at that point, but stopped because I was recovering from another surgery.
Today I get in the mail an envelope from a bill collector. You decided to sell my debt off for collection even though I was paying and had reached out to say “where are my monthly invoices?”
You people are disorganized jerks and I will tell everyone to start avoid being treated by anything Main Line Health related.
If this is how you treat women who have had breast cancer, who needs this crap?
Basically Lankenau can suck it. I have acted in good faith all along. And all along all the problems tag back to their screw ups in billing and “customer service”.
Having breast cancer is hard enough and dealing with everything after you have had surgery and treatment and start meds can be enough of a pain in the ass without dealing with healthcare systems and their way of doing business which only adds to patient stress levels a lot of the time.
ihavebreastcancerblog 
I’m sorry to hear you are still having problems with them, As if you need the extra stress… The problem with health care is that it’s all about money and big business and not about the patients. Anyone in those hospital systems who tries to make it sound otherwise is full of it. It’s good to write letters and be vocal if you have the energy for it. The more noise people make, the better. But our problems with health care in this country are far from being solved.
oh man. I hope you get a response.
I did from their social media people who gave me the phone number to the guy Scott who helped me two years ago and straightened it out….but all I got was his voicemail. I hope they figure it out because for Pete’s sake I have had to CHASE them and HARANGUE them just to pay the stupid bill. I am not trying to get out of paying it either which is the crazy part.
This has been a recurring nightmare of mine – adding to an anxiety level already heightened by the diagnosis on its own.
You’re supposed to make sure everyone else is doing their jobs correctly…!? You’re supposed to be your own “advocate”…dog whistle-ese for “any problems of our making should’ve been caught and addressed by you, the patient, the one with no access, no information, no power”. And then the answer is still “no, you’re wrong”. Sends me right to the closest pillow for my Muffled Scream Therapy.
I wish you all the luck in dealing with this asshattery. Not that it can make any tangible difference, but you have my commiseration (and likely a whooooole lotta fellow commiserators).
One thing if I may suggest: there is likely a Patient Advocate office at Lankenau. I know there is one at Bryn Mawr (that I have been on the verge of contacting but have not yet done so); both are Main Line Health. I believe they might be helpful with situations like yours as well as issues that come up between doc and patient. They might be able to get somewhere?
Bless, darlin’.
If is doesn’t clear it up and get it back on track I will look for the patient advocate. What I do know is they do not care for people taking these situations public as it screws with the warm happy fuzzy bunnies in PR. Thanks for commenting and blessing back at ya 🙂