Bwahaha! I actually laughed out loud. That last guy is exactly our GP.
Well, for what it’s worth, we went in again today and turns out he has an ear infection. So what I think happened is that he got two colds, one on top of the other, and then the second cold got stuck in his ear, and that’s why it all took so long. He’s on antibiotics now, so hopefully fever will go down soon!
And on the topic of payments: the copay was $20, since it was a sick visit. Well visits are completely covered, no copay. No idea what actual cost for a visit is. My hunch is that the doctor charging $350 for a regular sick visit was doing so because he knew the insurance would only cover a small percentage of whatever he charged.
The simple answer is they don’t. The “rack rates” charged for medical procedures are often inflated by 10-20 times what the doctor expects to receive after “in network” discounts are applied.
That’s the craziest figure I’ve ever heard for a simple office visit, however - usually I’ll see something like 150 listed, in network is 80, I owe 20% or 16.00 or whatever.
Ugh, I feel you. Out one year old spent most of the winter sick. Most notably, she spent maybe a week with horrible congestion, followed by an ear infection, followed by a bad stomach flu that landed us in the ER. Now we are both tapped out of sick leave and it’s only March.