Be wary when you go to the ER

In most cases you'll be charged a facility fee simply for walking through the door and seeking service. It does not include any care provided. And this fee can be quite expensive. These fees are coded on a 1 to 5 scale, to reflect the complexity of care delivered to the patient. The hospital decides the code to be used. The fees have risen sharply since 2009. Here are a few sample codes.

The facility fee has really increased.  The Health Care Cost Institute says the price of these fees rose 89 percent between 2009 and 2015 — rising twice as fast as the price of outpatient health care, and four times as fast as overall health care spending. This is probably due to a shift to using higher codes. Total ER revenue fees rose by more than $3 billion between 2009 and 2015, despite the fact the HCCI database shows a slight (2 percent) decline in the number of emergency room fees billed in the same time period.