Broken bones, broken bills

The biggest public hospital in San Francisco takes no private insurance, and sends out bills of more than $24,000 for a broken arm and $113,000 for a broken ankle, said Sarah Kliff in Vox.com. The charges from Zuckerberg San Francisco General—recently renamed after a $75 million gift from the Facebook founder—are some of the most egregious examples of the national problem of surprise bills. The San Francisco hospital is an extreme case because while “most big hospital ERs negotiate prices for care with major health insurance providers,” ZSFG does not. The problem is especially acute for patients who are “brought to the hospital by ambulance, still recovering from a trauma and with little ability to research or choose an in-network facility.” Insurers end up paying only the fraction they deem reasonable and sticking patients with the balance—in the case of the broken arm, $20,243.71. gists Barry Schlenker and Mark Leary, subjects were asked to predict their performance at a random task, from “very good” to “very poor.” Those who predicted they’d do well were consistently rated as more competent by observers, independent of how well they actually did. “The crystal-clear trend is that the subjects’ competence was evaluated higher if they had previously raised great expectations.”