The Surprise Insurance Gap: History, Context, and Proposed Solutions

Affordability of care is a major concern for many in the United States. Part of the affordability of care issue is unanticipated medical bills. A 2018 poll found that unexpected medical costs were the public ’s greatest affordability concern, ahead of prescription drug costs and even food or rent or mortgage. An important cause of unexpected medical bills is the surprise insurance network gap. The term “surprise billing” is commonly used to describe this problem of unanticipated out-of-network (OO N) care, though this is a misnomer because it is actually a “surprise insurance gap.” This gap can have significant consequences for patients and families.

Source: Journal of the American College of Radiology : JACR - December 31, 2019 Category: Radiology Authors: Richard E. Heller, Sherif Zaafran, Anthony Gabriel, Naveen Parti, Fredricka Richards Tags: Original article Source Type: research