I’ve always carried my insurance card with me. The basic member ID and plan info. Thinking has been that if I’m ever in an incapacitating incident, the hospital staff will look in my wallet, find I’m insured, and the provide the relevant standard of care (e.g. “looks like he’s got insurance—anaesthesia is a go!”). But after a lost-wallet scare and the general bulkiness of carrying a handful of cards, I’m wondering if that really is necessary. I’m assuming that by the time I’m somewhat conscious or ambulatory, I’ll be able to eek out that I have insurance and who to contact.
Assuming a worst-case scenario in which Mrs. Devil isn’t there to fill out forms right away, and assuming that I’ll have some ID on me anyway, is there any reason to keep toting the thing with me everywhere I go?
On a kayak adventure two (?) years ago I was hospitalized with dehydration, hypotension, etc (PSA: Beer alone isn’t much good for hydration purposes). I had no ID on me, but the nurse was able to go online (with a state of the art bedside unit) and ascertain I had coverage.
I’ve wondered this. A while back I was covered under insurance, but ended up seeing another doctor (NOT ER) and paying out of pocket with the understanding that I could file a claim later. The out of pocket cost ended up not being a whole lot and eventually I never bothered to file the claim. Once I paid up out of pocket, I’m not sure what motivation the doctor’s office would have in helping me fill out the claim forms and if I took a day off work to go down and sit with the insurance rep at the office and get everything filled out, well, I just lost money because I make more in a day than the visit cost out of pocket minus copay.
VOW- absolutely, 100 percent correct!! If we need to give any kind of treatment we need the med list. We can also determine what conditions the patient has by that list, because in times of stress, i.e Mr. VOW’s chest pain, you may not remember every pill he takes.
Example, Mr. X has a prescription for little blue pills, and he has chest pain, and he is self-conscious about revealing said script. We give him Nitroglycerine to relieve his chest pain and his BP tanks. Not a good thing.
Oh, and the insurance? We are more worried about patient care. We can usually get the insurance info from the hospital admit sheet.
He pulled a muscle in his chest wall, horseplaying with the Granddaughter in the back yard. He felt rather stupid doing the entire 911 call and transport to the ER, but EVERYONE told him they thought the panicked family did the RIGHT thing.
~VOW
As long as you have some form of ID on you, or you are wearing nice clothes, or show other signs that you’ll be able to pay the bill one way or another, it doesn’t matter. Sadly, if you appear to be indigent, the quality of care will drop off once you are stabilized.
Oh shoot, I tend to look indigent on a day-to-day basis.
Consensus seems to be that the risk is financial, not medical. I’ll continue to carry it normally, but it seems I won’t have to worry if for some reason I want to pack a slimmer, minimal wallet.
Good idea about the medications. I just printed and quasi-laminated (clear contact paper) a small list.
This summer I went to visit a friend for a week. Before leaving for the airport I went through my wallet and removed my grocery store point cards, library card, etc., because it seemed silly to take them with me and would save me some minor inconvenience if my wallet happened to be stolen while I was out of town. After a moment’s thought I also removed my insurance card, because what were the odds I’d need that while having a quiet vacation at my friend’s suburban home?
While I was on the plane one of my eyes started watering, which I thought was due to seasonal allergies. It didn’t stop for three days. Some Googling indicated that I almost certainly had an infection, so my friend took me to the local urgent care clinic. I wound up calling my landlady and getting her to go into my apartment and get my insurance card out of my desk, because although the clinic did actually have a reduced price available for people who paid cash up front this still would have cost me $80 more than my insurance co-pay. I could also have paid the non-reduced price (cash or charge) and filed with my insurance company later, but that would have been more hassle and paperwork to deal with and I was afraid I might forget or miss a deadline or something.
I had to get a prescription too so that could potentially have cost me a lot more money out of pocket if I hadn’t had my insurance info, although as it turned out I was able to go to the same chain grocery store where I get my prescriptions at home. They had all my info in their computer system and didn’t need my insurance number.
Anyway, if my landlady hadn’t been home or hadn’t been able to find my insurance card this incident would have been a bigger inconvenience than it was. I’ve decided it’s worth it to keep my insurance card in my wallet at all times. It’s not so the ER will find it if I’m brought in nearly dead, but so I don’t have to worry about playing phone tag with my landlady or dealing with extra paperwork later on if I run into some fairly minor medical problem that requires prompt treatment.
As you carrying a phone? Make an entry in your contact list with the account info. It won’t help if you are unable to operate your phone, but it will help in a lot of cases.
Speaking as a healthcare administrator…yes. My suggestion would be to keep a hard copy at home as well as with your emergency contact and one with you at all times.
If it’s an emergency, they aren’t going to deny you treatment because you don’t have it with you. However, if you survive the ordeal, it will make your life so much easier. There’s nothing worse than getting a bill for a few thousand dollars and having to deal wth the billing department and insurance company.
For instance, I had taken a friend of mine to the ER one night because he was having what I thought were convulsions. We went to the nearest hospital and, though he wasn’t capable of doing much himself at the time, I was able to pull out his insurance card. Because of that one little act, he never had to deal with the billing aspect later.
And another important thing to keep in mind: not all health computer systems are magic. I don’t know how many times patients come in with no insurance card (and don’t know where it is) and expect us to magically be able to type their name into the computer and find everything we need. Many times insurance companies have multiple plans and claims addresses. If we don’t have the card to see which it is, it might be routed to the wrong plan and then denied later only for you to get a bill in the mail.
Long story short (too late), at least keep a copy with you at all times. It’ll make any kind of emergency a little less frantic both at the time and after.
If I’m in a new city I’ll take photos of maps, my ID and the hotel address (especially useful for taxi drivers if the city is in a country which doesn’t use the Latin alphabet!) using my phone. Also I email myself these pictures and, if I’m feeling particularly industrious, duplicate the images on my camera.
If you’re saying this isn’t always the case you’d be correct. But it happens often. If you don’t have insurance or means to pay, you get treatment ‘by the book’, the minimal allowable care.
In my wallet I have my health insurance card, and a second card with emergency information. It is a list of phone numbers of family and friends, as well as allergies and (current) medications. It’s easy to print/trim a small sheet with this info, and then head to a Kinko’s shop to get it laminated. They have small lamination pouches available there that will result in a credit-card-sized item that is waterproof and durable, and slides nicely into a wallet pocket. The end sticking out of the wallet pocket says “EMERGENCY CONTACTS” in large font; when someone opens my wallet, that’s one of the first things they see. My insurance card is right behind that.
Carrying the insurance card with you can save you a lot of hassle; carrying emergency info with you can help save your life.
