My wife had to go to the ER 24 yrs after delivering our second kid because of a medical error during post partum care at the same hospital. She sat in the ER from 9pm until 6am 72 hrs after giving birth and was offered the womens bathroom to pump in. She never saw a doctor or got past triage despite the delivery unit telling her to go to the ER immediately. We got a 4.5k bill, insurance paid most of it, but we’ve refused to pay the deductible on principal.

After to many of these we just have a family policy that we are the final arbiters of a reasonable and fair medical bill given the error rates in billing. We have a high enough credit score that collections doesn’t scare us.