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Our experience of having a baby

Our experience of having a baby

Old Feb 12th 2011, 2:48 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by Bob
I think a lot of this does depend on the hospital you use and possibly to some extent to the insurance.
I know both of mine got different things, even different brands of diapers and formula and they were only a year apart at the same hospital with the same insurance, I asked them about it to make sure they hadn't suddenly decided the stuff we'd given my son was poison and they said it just depends on what the companies decide to give them for free. Considering a lot of people try to keep their kids on the same formula and diapers they get in the hospital it makes sense for them to give a week or two of freebies.

Congratulations on number 2, though if your 2 are anything like mine you'll discover that 2 is infinitely more difficult than one.
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Old Feb 12th 2011, 3:27 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by steve100100

Anyway, he spent twelve days in NICU. The cost to me? $42,000

Paying $100 a month forever. But it's not necessary to hit the panic button just yet.
Aye, little scary at the thought, we'll see what happens. Tomorrow will be 2 weeks in the NICU.
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 12:13 am
  #33  
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

So today, they started getting us ready for discharge, which probably won't happen for a few more days.

We've got to watch a infant CPR video at the hospital, they'll be giving us "recipe" book of formula and we got instructions of what to do, like a specific teaspoon measure, that the formula has to be chucked after a month etc.

We were given a tub of formula and told we would probably be given a few more before we're done and that we should ask the doctor for a prescription because the baby is still so small, which would be good till she is 9 month old, so that should help a lot.

Also found out that there's a breastmilk bank type thing near the hospital, where you get $45 per ounce of breast milk, but you've got to provide 100 ounces at a time if you wanted to sell it....which we might have to do, because the freezer is seriously starting to creep me out right now
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 5:02 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Congrats Bob, hope our little one gets to come home soon. She is gorgeous.

I had my little boy 5 weeks ago, elective c-section + 2 days in the hospital. The hospital bill arrived at the weekend and I just thought I'd show what it cost us. I was a dependent on my husband's insurance (90/10, $15 co-pay, $100 deductible) until 20 weeks and I then started graduate school where I got my own insurance (80/20, $30 co-pay, $300 deductible).

The first thing I did when I got my insurance was confirm that they would cover the pregnancy and I then ran the numbers of paying for another year on my husband's plan but having secondary insurance vs. cancelling. If baby had been due in December I would have kept his insurance until the end of the year by opting out during annual enrollment.

Anyway, these are the final costs to me (I realise a c-section is going to make it more expensive).
Hospital: $1300 - the actual bill was $15,000 there was a random $10,000 deduction and then I paid 20% + room costs
Doctor: $850 - this is for everything from the 1st visit @ 10 weeks, through the delivery to my 6 week check-up.
Labs: not sure exactly but $30-40 dollars over the 9 months

I had 2 ultrasounds that my doctor referred me to (@20 and 36 weeks). On both occasions I paid my co-pay but this was later refunded as I guess insurance covered it all.

Prior to the birth I had investigated what it was going to cost me. I have a friend with the same plan, same doctor who had her baby in the same hospital and told me to budget $1500 for the hospital, which I did. Two days before I was due to go in I got a call from a financial representative which went like this "Your patient responsibility amount is $5500 can I have your visa card number?". Needless to say I got pretty upset. I questioned her and requested that she mail a breakdown of costs as I wasn't willing to pay a bill I hadn't seen and she just said "we don't do that". Nothing more was heard until the bill arrived in the mail last weekend for $303 (I had paid $1000 deposit) along with huge sighs of relief. I had great care in the hospital and my doctor was fantastic but needless to say I'll be drafting a strongly worded letter to the billing department in the next few weeks.
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 5:08 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by lonestargirl
Labs: not sure exactly but $30-40 dollars over the 9 months
Just curious but how is this so little - what blood tests did you have? We have racked up nearly 1k of blood tests so far of which we have to pay 15%, and I am only 13 weeks. (Still waiting to get the actual bill from the doctor but I can see it on my online claims history). That isn't even including the Downs blood test I had the other day. Am I being conned?

Is it standard that the hospital ask you for a deposit before you go in - any ideas roughly when?
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 6:42 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Firstly, congratulations on your pregnancy and I hope everything goes smoothly.

Originally Posted by NatashaB
Just curious but how is this so little - what blood tests did you have? We have racked up nearly 1k of blood tests so far of which we have to pay 15%, and I am only 13 weeks. (Still waiting to get the actual bill from the doctor but I can see it on my online claims history). That isn't even including the Downs blood test I had the other day. Am I being conned?
I didn't have the Downs test as I'm not a risk group (I've just turned 27, no family history).

I've just added up my bills and they are actually $15 for bloods done at the doctors and $8 for bloods done at the hospital. I did have $100 of blood work in March as I lost a baby then. I wonder if your bill we be as big as you think. I'm just looking at blood work I had done in June. The book cost was $377 but they wrote off $312.70, insurance paid $57.87 leaving me with $6.43. All my bills have similar large 'adjustments' so I hope yours will too.

Originally Posted by NatashaB
Is it standard that the hospital ask you for a deposit before you go in - any ideas roughly when?
I have no idea if it is standard policy, I was having an elective section so I don't know if that is the reason. I paid the $1000 2 days before going in (after the conversation with the annoying woman). My doctor wanted to be paid by 7 months - this was flagged well in advance and you could pay in stages.
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 6:54 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Thanks, I've seen those adjustments on several of our other bills - all seems a bit strange to me that they have a fixed price and then change it depending on what the insurance is willing to pay. I'm sure it will all work itself out, just need to make sure we have some money stashed away in case they demand deposits! I was under the impression we would be billed afterwards since they couldn't know in advance exactly what costs I would incur.
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Old Feb 14th 2011, 11:38 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

So we saw the the CPR video, very cheesy, but a good little refresher on the course we did before. Surreal taking the plastic bag off the dolls head though, but it had been sterilised

The night nurses made us a baby valentines card, which a photo and foot prints, which was very sweet and made our day.

Speaking of photo's. Our first child, the hospital had a photographer come around and do shots, which were nice, but a bit pricey, but we got a set at the time. This time around because our baby went straight into NICU, we didn't get the hospital photographer come by, but the nurses did take a photo and give us a print from day one and we have also been given a couple of photo's over the last couple of weeks, as well as the one in the Valentines card.
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 2:17 am
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Thumbs up Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by Bob
So we saw the the CPR video, very cheesy, but a good little refresher on the course we did before. Surreal taking the plastic bag off the dolls head though, but it had been sterilised

The night nurses made us a baby valentines card, which a photo and foot prints, which was very sweet and made our day.

Speaking of photo's. Our first child, the hospital had a photographer come around and do shots, which were nice, but a bit pricey, but we got a set at the time. This time around because our baby went straight into NICU, we didn't get the hospital photographer come by, but the nurses did take a photo and give us a print from day one and we have also been given a couple of photo's over the last couple of weeks, as well as the one in the Valentines card.
Awwww - Bless!

You're obviously a very proud Daddy, Bob! All the Best to your new daughter and all of your family....and a wonderful "Welcome Home" for the new baby sometime this week
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 7:08 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Baby had another breathing stutter last night which reset her discharge clock unless she went on caffeine and a breathing monitor.

The nurse said that if it'll be cheaper to release her with the caffeine and breathing monitor they'll do that, so the social worker at the NICU is calling back and forth between the missus's HR benefits people, the insurance people and the folks who rent out the equipment, as well as the hospital finance to see what kind of deal we can get for our 10% of the bills.

At least we'd only need the monitor for 8 weeks, which means a month by month bill, if we needed it for 12 months, we'd have been required to pay 6 months up front.

Getting the baby added onto the insurance is a bit of a pain, partly because baby hasn't been discharged yet so no bills of the NICU have been submitted yet, we still haven't gotten her SSN, which means we'd need a birth certificate as proof, which is taking our town a month to process apparently. She needs to be added on by 1st March because that's the cut off of her being treated as part of mum for insurance, other wise we'd have to wait till next enrolment period, next year.

Also, apparently since 1st Jan, baby wellness check ups, immunisations/vaccinations and flu jabs for mother and baby are supposed to be co-pay free for those with insurance. If that's the case, should save a fortune as we'd need to see the doctor weekly to adjust the caffeine dosage if we have to use it, and co-pays being $20 and having to run the course for 8 weeks

Edit: to add - Aprea (sp?) The folks who rent out the equipment, first ones to get back to us and said with a 90/10 split we'd have to pay them $17 a month and they wanted a credit/debit card to set up a rolling payment in advance. We told them we'd just pay cash for that on delivery for the two months.

Last edited by Bob; Feb 15th 2011 at 7:52 pm. Reason: additional info
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 8:57 pm
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Crikey Bob you could do without all the financial shenanigans...all the best xx
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 9:51 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

So after a bit more phone mangling, battle will continue tomorrow on our catch 22 type situation.

Hospital won't discharge until we have a breathing monitor, fair enough.

Rental people won't let us rent until the insurance pay them their 90% portion, fair enough.

Insurance won't pay the 90% portion till baby is properly added onto the policy, rather than as an extension of mum which is the case now, because this thing will go on past 1st March, fair enough.

We can't add her to the insurance policy properly until we either get a SSN, which hasn't arrived yet, or a copy of birth certificate, which is taking our town a month to process at the moment apparently, or we have hospital bills showing the birth, which we can't get because the hospital won't process those until the baby is discharged.

The rental people said they would need this figured out by the early AM or we might not be able to get the breathing monitor type that the hospital is using until next week.

So from a potential discharge of tomorrow or Thursday, it could now well be a lot later because of bureaucracy. At this rate, we won't need the monitor and she'll have graduated college
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 9:53 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by Bob
So after a bit more phone mangling, battle will continue tomorrow on our catch 22 type situation.

Hospital won't discharge until we have a breathing monitor, fair enough.

Rental people won't let us rent until the insurance pay them their 90% portion, fair enough.

Insurance won't pay the 90% portion till baby is properly added onto the policy, rather than as an extension of mum which is the case now, because this thing will go on past 1st March, fair enough.

We can't add her to the insurance policy properly until we either get a SSN, which hasn't arrived yet, or a copy of birth certificate, which is taking our town a month to process at the moment apparently, or we have hospital bills showing the birth, which we can't get because the hospital won't process those until the baby is discharged.

The rental people said they would need this figured out by the early AM or we might not be able to get the breathing monitor type that the hospital is using until next week.

So from a potential discharge of tomorrow or Thursday, it could now well be a lot later because of bureaucracy. At this rate, we won't need the monitor and she'll have graduated college
Oh my ****ing God. They all deal every single day with newborn babies yet they act like this is the first child that has ever been born in the history of for ****ing ever. Assholes.
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 9:57 pm
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And since when do healthcare providers get to demand money in advance for services not rendered yet?!??!!? :curse:
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Old Feb 15th 2011, 10:02 pm
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Default Re: Our experience of having a baby

Originally Posted by Leslie66
Oh my ****ing God. They all deal every single day with newborn babies yet they act like this is the first child that has ever been born in the history of for ****ing ever. Assholes.
That's quite a good summary.

The doctors and nurses were pretty much saying the same thing
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