The Observation Deck

I have been hearing in the media that the Clinic has made changes to their billing. And that typical doctor visits are not just covered by a simple co-pay any longer. My coworker heard the same thing and got an email response from the clinic:


Thank you for contacting Cleveland Clinic through our website.



The Cleveland Clinic has made the decision to designate all of our outpatient arears on main cmapus and throughout our Family Health Centers, except Wooster, as hospital outpatient departments. This decison will simplify our billing processes and will help cover the cost of maintaining the Clinic's hospital and outpatient sites. This conversion started on March 1, 2009 for Main Campus and Family Health Centers. This is a Medicare driven initiative which other hospitals have been doing for years, but is something the Clinic has not done at some of it's buildings.

Patients bills will now include two separate charges- one for the healthcare provider fee and one for a facility fee to partially defray the costs of providing non-physician staff, equipment, supplies,ect. Our goal is to be upfront with our patients and what their costs may be when they receive their care from us.

Many commercial payors cover this additional fee. Contact your insurance company to understand your benefit design.

This whole discussion was precipitated by a bill my co-worker just received from Fairview, a Cleveland Clinic hospital. She saw a doctor at the MOB right next to the hospital and her copay was not applicable. This doctor was covered before on our insurance and suddenly, one of the things she got that day was labeled 'outpatient' and they want $200 for it.

There's was something about this on NPR this morning, specifically that all CC medical bills are now carrying a $55 facilities fee; previously this fee only applied to main campus bills.

The guest was a PD reporter who had been investigating in, so there may be something in today's paper.