By the time she was hospitalized in 2020, Pearlene Darby, a retired teacher, had suffered open sores on both legs, both hips, and both heels, as well as a five-inch-long gash on her tailbone. She died two weeks later at age 81 from infections and bedsores, according to her death certificate. Her daughter sued the…
Montana officials said they are moving forward with plans to allow Medicaid to pay doulas, reversing a previous statement that budget problems had prompted them to pause the effort to reimburse the birth workers. But officials warned that all optional Medicaid services are still under review as the state health department looks for cuts to…
Nearly four years after doctors declared Marielle Santos McLeod free of colon cancer, she has yet to feel liberated from the burden of medical expenses. McLeod, who lives near Charleston, South Carolina, is still paying off chemotherapy bills that followed her 2017 diagnosis. She also now faces an onslaught of out-of-pocket costs for follow-up monitoring…
California lawmakers alarmed by the treatment of people brought to hospitals by federal immigration agents want to strengthen protections for detained patients receiving care at medical facilities, including by making it easier for their families and attorneys to find them. Two bills moving through the state Senate seek to prevent immigration enforcement officers from isolating…
After decades of selling insurance, Illinois-based broker John Jaggi had never seen anything like it. More than 80 of his customers who were enrolled in the same Medicare supplemental plan from the insurer Chubb got hit last August with a 45% increase. “In my 49 years of doing biz as a broker, I’ve never seen…
In this “How Would You Fix It?” interview, Julie Rovner, KFF Health News’ chief Washington correspondent and host of the What the Health? podcast, sat down with David Blumenthal — a physician, health policy expert, former Obama administration official, and author — to explore the dynamics that make fixing the nation’s health care system so…
In the last months, weeks, and days of his life, “I will not go to the emergency room” became my husband’s mantra. Andrej had esophageal cancer that had spread throughout his body (but not to his ever-willful brain), and, having trained as a doctor, I had jury-rigged a hospital at home, aided by specialists who…
How often do hospitals, physicians, and other providers sue patients over unpaid bills? That’s a question we’ve asked a lot over the last several years at KFF Health News. Since 2022, we’ve been working with newsrooms around the country, such as the Connecticut Mirror, to explore the scale and impact of America’s medical debt crisis….
Silvana Toska was playing in a grass field with her daughters late last fall when she felt a sting on her ankle. The family had come to listen for barred and great horned owls as the sun set on a large park near their Davidson, North Carolina, home. It was “just like a mosquito bite,…
Tory Starr is worried about the people who get medical care at Open Door Community Health Centers along California’s North Coast. “They’re the folks that work at restaurants. They’re the teacher’s aides,” said Starr, a registered nurse who became Open Door’s chief executive more than six years ago. Those patients, he said, are “really the…