Seniors

I'm a senior, recently was hospitalized with a heart attack, but didn't need home physical therapy. Medicare is paying for 36 weeks of cardiac rehab, although I do have a copay. Lucky me, I can afford the copay.

The hospital stay was billed at around $80,000 for three days. That includes the cath lab bill for the stent and everything else connected to it. Medicare paid about $32,000, the rest was written off other than $885 I needed to pay. Which, again, I can easily afford.

Many years ago, around 1974 or so, I had a small medical crisis, and after insurance, I was left with some kind of copay. I wish I could remember what the total was, but it was more than I could imagine being able to pay off, and in a panic I went to the station manager's secretary. She was able, quickly, calmly, and efficiently, to separate the wheat from the chaff and let me know that I owed maybe twenty dollars. Which was still a fair amount of money for me, living as I was from paycheck to paycheck, but it was vastly better than the sixty dollars I remember as being the bill. This was in perhaps 1973, so that sixty dollars was more than $300 today. And again, living paycheck to paycheck as I was then, that was a lot of money.

What we can afford really matters.