Even after the bleeding has stopped, the wound has healed, and the pain has subsided, studies have found that people who survive severe trauma have a lasting impact on their financial health.
Those who suffered injuries severe enough to require hospitalization in the past two years had a much higher proportion and magnitude of both the proportion and magnitude of working-age delinquent medical debts and collection agency involvement. compared to others like.
Bankruptcy filings were also twice as high in the post-injury group. According to data published in JAMA Health Forum By a team from the University of Michigan.
In order to make apples-to-apples comparisons as much as possible, this study examined medical care from two groups of adults aged 18 to 65 years who had the same type of commercial insurance but were seriously injured in different years. use and financial data.
People who suffered major injuries 18 months before the study’s financial “snapshot” were more likely to recover their medical debt than those whose injuries occurred after the financial “snapshot”. 23% higher and 70% higher medical debt collections. check.
In both groups, very few people filed for bankruptcy, but twice as many among those who had been hospitalized for trauma in the past year and a half.
The findings suggest that health insurance plans should be redesigned to reduce or limit the cost burden of much-needed trauma care. John Scott, MD, MPH, First author of the paper. Scott, an assistant professor of surgery, cares for critically injured patients at UM’s Academic Medical His Center, Michigan His Medicine.
“Much of our medical research to date has focused on improving outcomes while patients are hospitalized, but not on how their lives are affected as they recover. “Our findings show that the negative impact of trauma on patients’ lives does not end with hospital discharge. We have bills that we cannot afford to pay, and there is emerging evidence that this debt may further impact our ability to achieve optimal recovery.”
Scott worked with Nora Becker, M.D., Ph.D., An assistant professor of internal medicine and other researchers at the Michigan Health Economics and Affordability Lab (M-HEAL) linked nearly 5,400 people’s insurance records to their January 2021 credit reports to protect their identities. .
They compared people who were hospitalized in 2019 and early 2020 (the group whose credit data were obtained ‘post-injury’) and a comparison group similar in many respects except that hospitalizations due to injuries occurred in 2021. You have selected (group for which credit data was obtained). Data are taken “pre-injury”).
On average, both groups spent an average of five days in the hospital for their injuries, and just over a third of both groups spent at least one night in the intensive care unit.
Depending on how their health insurance plan is structured, these patients face hundreds or thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs and out-of-pocket costs that must be paid out of pocket for hospital treatment and follow-up appointments. You may be facing deductibles, notes Scott.
While insurers and employers have primarily used deductibles and copays as a way to curb unnecessary use of health care, researchers say that post-injury care is largely voluntary and is more important to survival and It points out that it is necessary for good long-term results.
“Nobody is overpaying for trauma care just because the deductible is low,” Scott said. “Abolish or limit trauma deductibles – just as recent policies cap the cost of insulin for Medicare patients – It can go a long way in helping all patients achieve optimal recovery after injury. Failure to recognize the realities of the economic challenges that patients face risks pushing them into poverty. “
In addition to Scott and Becker, also published, Findings on the Economic Costs of Living with Multiple Chronic Illnesses, authors of this study include Kirstin W. Scott, MD, M.Phil., Ph.D. Michelle Moniz, MD, M.Sc.; Erin F. Carlton, MD, M.Sc.; Renuka Tipirneni, MD, M.Sc. Most of the authors are members of the UM Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation and M-HEAL .
This study was funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (HS028672, HS025465, HS028817).
Papers Cited: “Posttraumatic Economic Outcomes in Working-Age U.S. Adults with Commercial Insurance” JAMA Health Forum. DOI: 10.1001/jamahealthforum.2022.4105
