Is it expensive to have a baby in the US?

[Plarka]

I live in the UK but am American.  I've had my babies over here though.  My sister said that my SIL and brother have a $10,000 bill from the hospital from having the baby!!! Is this normal over there?  (It's all free over here.)

[SubliminalDarkness]

Yes, or much more. And I'm guessing that 10,000 didn't include prenatal or postnatal care, just the delivery itself. 

[Plarka]

Doesn't insurance cover this stuff?  Man oh man, that's crazy!  So does everyone have these bills?

[woodchick]

Our insurance covered our births. We paid a co-pay, but it was less than $1000.

[mamadiamond]

my birth was free because my husband is in the military so we have very very good insurance, but without insurance it would have been $8,000 just for the birth, not counting the pre-natal care and testing.

[poorlittlefish]

We paid $5K out of pocket but we have a high deductible plan.  With out older DD, we had much more expensive insurance and the birth didn't cost anything out of pocket.  It really depends on the route you want to take with insur

This might be being anal but your birth wasn't "free."  I have issue when people with national health care plans say that things were free, they are paid for with taxes so you are paying for them one way or another.

[happysmileylady]

Unless someone doesn't have any insurance at all, it's pretty unusual to receive a bill for the whole $10k for a delivery, most of it is usually covered by insurance.  There's usually some sort of co-pay, $1k, $2k, etc.  Now, if a delivery is not typical, if there are complications, then the overall bill goes much higher, which means the out of pocket cost for the parents would go much higher as well.  That could result in an actual bill for $10k.  Or, as I said, if they have no insurance at all and are totally self pay, then they might receive a bill for $10k. 

But if they have insurance, and the delivery was without complications, it's more likely that all they have seen is what the delivery actually cost, not necessarily what they owe.

I imagine that in the UK and other universal healthcare countries, deliveries still run similar numbers, it's just that you don't see it because it's paid for by the universal healthcare system. 

[Plarka]

Originally Posted by poorlittlefish 

We paid $5K out of pocket but we have a high deductible plan.  With out older DD, we had much more expensive insurance and the birth didn't cost anything out of pocket.  It really depends on the route you want to take with insur

This might be being anal but your birth wasn't "free."  I have issue when people with national health care plans say that things were free, they are paid for with taxes so you are paying for them one way or another.

I don't work, so I don't pay National Insurance, so it's free for me.

[chattyprincess]

I have had 2 dd's with our insurance my prenatal care is free and both births were free. I have never had a bill and never will have a bill (dd1 is 4.5 and dd2 is 8mths). It competely depends on your insurance etc. That being said we are expats in Canada right now and if I had delivered my girls here I would have had to pay $30,000 out of pocket to be reimbursed by my insurance.(we would have had to mail the bills to our insurance and then  be cut a check from them to make up the costs, huge hassle) Certain parts of the health care up here is free for residence and if you qualify for a health card but it is not free to everyone.....

That being said I find the $10,000 out rageous, we saw the bills from both of my deliveries and what our insurance paid and there is no way it was even close to that!

[Knitting Mama]

The big problem over here is that everybody's insurance is different-- if they have insurance at all. We are super duper lucky to have VERY good insurance, and my co-pay was $100 for delivery, including all of the stupid interventions I had to have because of my stupid blood pressure (I'm not bitter). But a friend who delivered at the same hospital had a $5,000 bill to pay because her insurance didn't cover everything. There is no national health care because of OMG SOCIALISM, and coverage for people who need it from the state varies state by state (and if you're here in Arizona, is basically non-existent anymore).

[Greenlea]

I had insurance with my first son, so my bill was $2500 which was my deductible.  I don't know what my insurance actually paid out though.  However, I have talked to several moms and many that actually saw their bills said they were charged things that they never had, like lab costs or a urine sample.  My SIL was charged for an epidural she never had! 

With my 2nd I didn't have insurance, but we also made too much to qualify for any type of aid.  When researching our options I found the hospital by us charged $10-17K for a birth (not including prenatal, etc.).  And that was for a typical birth, no emergencies and not for a c-section.  If I wanted to birth there w/out insurance I had to come up with $2500 up front for the midwife too, then I would get a bill for the actual birth later. 

We decided to do a homebirth then, so we didn't have that debt hanging over us and a CNM was charging $4000 for a homebirth.  We went with a lay midwife though that cost us only $2000 plus $40 for each prenatal visit.

So yeah, having babies is expensive.

[SubliminalDarkness]

I'll agree here that it depends on your insurance. Some people don't have insurance and have to pay out of pocket. Some people have state insurance because they qualify based on low income and so they don't have to pay for it out of pocket.

With the insurance we had when DS1 was born our hospital was covered at 80%, so we had to pay that 20%. I think the overall bill was around $8,000 and that was a Pitocin induction, epidural, and three total days in the hospital. DS1 and I were healthy and we didn't have any complications. 

With DS2 our insurance covered 100% after our $100 co-pay for any in-patient hospital care. That bill was around $7,000 and that was no medication of any kind except one dose of Cervadil, and we were only in the hospital for one day but we 'upgraded' to a private room. 

[SunRise]

With my first, I had insurance through my work, so besides the amount I paid monthly for insurance, I didn't pay anything else.

With my second I had private insurance. SO I was paying for private insurance (started @ 900 / mth and went up 200 each year). Other then paying for the insurance, I didn't have other costs associated with prenatal and delivery.

A self-pay quote from the OBG for prenatal and a none-complicated birth was 6000 for prenatal appts and aprox 6000 for the birth. And then more money for the pediatrician check up in the hospital. I chose the private insurance just in case.

[Areia]

Originally Posted by SunRise 

With my first, I had insurance through my work, so besides the amount I paid monthly for insurance, I didn't pay anything else.

Same here.  I didn't have a co-pay for my pre-natal care or the hospital birth (I did get a break down of cost for the birth though and it was just over $15,000).  However, my plan didn't cover my doula so that cost us $1,200.
 

[Bokonon]

Delivery and special care unit for my son who was 8 weeks premature was over $250,000, almost 6 years ago.  I have good insurance, and paid $1200 for the entire pregnancy and both of our hospital stays.

When my 6-week premature daughter was born, I spent 3 weeks in the hospital and she spent 10 days, and her stay was over $100,000 alone, and I never saw a statement for my acute care stay and all the medications and procedures I had done.  We had difference insurance that time and I think we paid $750 for my whole pregnancy and both our stays.

And OP, even if YOU aren't paying into the system, everyone who works is.  At some point in your life when you do pay into the system, it will be to cover everyone else as well.  Nothing is free.

[allisonrose]

For my recent birth, the hospital billed my insurance company about $10,000 for me (only stayed one day rather than two) and another $1,000 for my son's stay. The OB on call billed them another $2,000 for delivering and the ped also billed $250 for seeing my son in hospital. The insurance company reduced the fees and covered their portion and our part will be roughly $1,600.

For my first birth, the hospital billed the insurance something along the lines of $18,000. Our copay was $400.

[P.J.]

I'm American and well aware of health care costs there, but I am sitting here like: as I read this!

We live in Germany, and I am on public insurance (not the same as universal, but what is required by law if you are employed). I have no deductible, and my insurance paid for all of the following:

~ 6x ultrasound, including once at a specialist to check for a suspected problem

~ all regular midwife prenatal care

~ midwife at beginning of home birth

~ hospital birth / cesearean and 5 days of care in hospital afterwards

~ midwife post-natal care; home visits up to 8 weeks PP & 1x gyn visit

~ consultations with lactation consultants and a colic advisor

~ iron supplements PP

~ rental of pump for 1 month

The only things I had to pay for out of pocket were:

~ the quarterly "office fee" at my gyn's office 2x, which is 10 € each time

~ our room at the hospital, which we chose to have...they would've paid for a "normal" room, but we opted for the "family room" which was deluxe with our own bathroom and room for all of us, DH and baby stayed with me in the room the entire 5 days. It cost 75 € / day.

Regardless of who pays for it, medical costs here are way below what they are in the US. It's all highly regulated and by law there is a fixed price for every single thing a doctor does. I'm still always surprised when I see how comparatively little a trip to the doc costs here.

The pathetic state of health insurance in the US is one of the main reasons we aren't moving back there, unfortunately. I sure hope it changes someday. In the meantime I feel slightly guilty for what I get here when I have to listen to my mother cry over her neverending insurance nightmares. Anyway, I digress.....

[1stTimeMama4-4-10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by happysmileylady 

Unless someone doesn't have any insurance at all, it's pretty unusual to receive a bill for the whole $10k for a delivery, most of it is usually covered by insurance.  There's usually some sort of co-pay, $1k, $2k, etc.  Now, if a delivery is not typical, if there are complications, then the overall bill goes much higher, which means the out of pocket cost for the parents would go much higher as well.  That could result in an actual bill for $10k.  Or, as I said, if they have no insurance at all and are totally self pay, then they might receive a bill for $10k. 

But if they have insurance, and the delivery was without complications, it's more likely that all they have seen is what the delivery actually cost, not necessarily what they owe.

I imagine that in the UK and other universal healthcare countries, deliveries still run similar numbers, it's just that you don't see it because it's paid for by the universal healthcare system. 

Actually no.  In universal healthcare countries, healthcare costs are dramatically less expensive. http://www.visualeconomics.com/healthcare-costs-around-the-world_2010-03-01/ The healthcare costs in the US are staggering compared with virtually every other industrialized nation. The cost of birthing a healthy babe in most countries would not come close to $10k.  For that matter, in the US it shouldn't come close to that.  For all of my prenatal care and the birth itself it was going to cost around $4k TOTAL at my birth center (which was all covered by insurance).  We transferred to the hospital, so it would have been a bit more, but not $10k. 

[Bokonon]

Originally Posted by 1stTimeMama4-4-10 

Quote:

Actually no.  In universal healthcare countries, healthcare costs are dramatically less expensive. http://www.visualeconomics.com/healthcare-costs-around-the-world_2010-03-01/ The healthcare costs in the US are staggering compared with virtually every other industrialized nation. The cost of birthing a healthy babe in most countries would not come close to $10k.  For that matter, in the US it shouldn't come close to that.  For all of my prenatal care and the birth itself it was going to cost around $4k TOTAL at my birth center (which was all covered by insurance).  We transferred to the hospital, so it would have been a bit more, but not $10k. 

But how much do malpractice premiums factor into that?  Isn't that partly what's driving up healthcare costs in the U.S., especially in obstetrics?

[mra]

I only paid one $40.00 copay at the beginning of my pregnancy. My insurance covered everything else, including the birth.