Articles
From our team
Research and commentary from Aletheia Health on claim denials, billing errors, and what they cost patients and practices.
Articles
Research and commentary from Aletheia Health on claim denials, billing errors, and what they cost patients and practices.
The Commonwealth Fund ·
By Alex Hoagland (Co-Founder of Aletheia Health)
Why insured patients keep receiving bills for care they expected to be covered, how inappropriate claim denials add to medical debt and erode trust in the health system, and the policies that would stop these denials and help patients contest and reverse their bills.
The Conversation ·
By Alex Hoagland (Co-Founder of Aletheia Health) and Michal Horný (UMass Amherst)
The Affordable Care Act makes services like wellness visits and cancer screenings free, yet many insured patients are still billed for them. Those unexpected bills fall hardest on people with lower incomes, people of color, and people without a college degree.
Research by our team in peer-reviewed journals. Aletheia Health authors are shown in bold.
JAMA Network Open ·
By Allan Tran, Audrey Laporte, Eric Nauenberg, and Alex Hoagland
Among more than 1.2 million privately insured patients, people with chronic conditions were more likely to be charged for preventive care the Affordable Care Act makes free, and paid about 20% more for it, pointing to gaps in how insurers apply the cost-sharing exemption.
Health Affairs ·
By Michal Horný, Olivia Yu, and Alex Hoagland
National remittance data show that patients with low household incomes and from historically disadvantaged racial and ethnic groups carry the heaviest burden from claim denials, and that patients earning under $50,000 a year are the least likely to have a denied claim contested.
American Journal of Preventive Medicine ·
By Alex Hoagland, Olivia Yu, and Michal Horný
Across 1.7 million preventive care visits, 40% left patients with out-of-pocket costs, and both the chance and the size of those costs varied by education, income, race and ethnicity.
JAMA Network Open ·
By Alex Hoagland, Olivia Yu, and Michal Horný
Among 1.5 million patients seeking preventive care, insurance denials were more common for lower-income, less educated, Asian, Hispanic and Black patients. The lowest-income patients had 43% higher odds of a denial than the highest-income patients.
Preventive Medicine ·
By Alex Hoagland and Paul Shafer
In 2018, Americans with employer coverage were still charged between $75 million and $219 million for preventive services that should have been free, most often for women’s services and basic screenings, and most often in the South and in rural areas.