[barberousse]

I actually paid $100 for a trip to the emergency room with this strange pain under my left pectoral and got told they couldn't a damn thing, probably just muscle pain. I think its related to how much I'm seated throughout the day.

[ben_jones]

Wait what? I would expect an emergency room trip in the US to be $1,000 - $10,000 particularly somewhere like S.F., especially since most emergency room visits are to the nearest hospital which could be out-of-network.

[cableshaft]

It varies by hospital and insurance. One of my visits to ER was $1300. Once I moved to the next town over a couple months later, the other two ER visits to a different hospital were $650 each.

BUT, that $1300 really caught me by surprise because about five years ago I had gone to the same hospital, for the same thing, and let myself be admitted to stay overnight for more tests, and that only cost me $450 ($150 copay and $300 for a doctor that visited during that).

And yeah, that's one reason why I hesitate to go to ER now. Having to pay about $4000 for a few ER visits and a few extra tests afterwards that all came back negative was not my idea of a fun way to spend money that summer (fun fact, I also had to pay $4000 in car repairs that same summer. It was a fun summer).