Patients are getting surprise charges from obstetric emergency rooms, often unaware that they were receiving emergency care, Kaiser Health News reported Oct. 13.
The outlet reviewed the bills a dozen patients received for obstetric emergency rooms. Few of them knew they were receiving emergency care or recalled entering a space marked as an emergency room.
Proponents of the emergency departments say they allow hospitals to pay for full time hospitalists — obstetric providers who don't need to split time between patients in the hospital and clinic visits.
Three of the four main companies that set up obstetric emergency rooms are affiliated with private equity firms, and critics say these emergency departments are more about maximizing revenue than improving outcomes.
Robert Wacther, MD, chair of the department of medicine at the University of California San Francisco, told the outlet that hospitals find ways to afford hospitalists in other specialties without opening emergency departments.
"I'm always a little skeptical of the justification," Dr. Wachter told Kaiser Health News. "They will always have a rationale for why income maximization is a reasonable and moral strategy."
Read the full report here.