[PSA] Concerned about the cost of a Dermatologist? These are your options.

Beauty Tips For Body Care
If you're worried about the cost of visiting a dermatologist, you do have options. It just requires a bit of easy research. (This is for health-care in the US)First, you have two options for billing: directly to you (known as Self Pay), or to your insurance.SELF PAYWhat some people don't know is that you don't have to disclose your insurance to your provider. Doing this will force you to self pay. Keep in mind that once you give your insurance info to them, they are required to bill them and the self pay option is no longer available to you. (Some offices are a bit more relaxed on this rule than others, I've encountered some that will still let you bypass your insurance.)Self Pay rates for dermatologists in my area range from $100-150 per visit. Zoc Doc lets you search by self pay prices, or just call the office. Prices may go up or down depending on whether it's an initial visit vs follow up. Call, ask, take notes.INSURANCEIn-Network vs Out-of-Network: Choosing a provider who is In-Network will get you a better rate. Your insurance negotiates rates with those providers for lower prices, so skip Out-of-Network unless you have no other options.Negotiated Rates: This is the price of an office visit that your doctor and your insurance have agreed upon. This will vary by office, insurance, and visit type (initial, follow up, or more complicated such as mole removal). For example, an office will bill insurance $150, but the negotiated rate with that insurance is $100. Great, a better price! Call your insurance (phone number is on the back of your card) or the doctor's office to inquire about negotiated rates.DEDUCTIBLESIf you have a deductible, that is how much money you will have to pay before insurance benefits kick in. A deductible shouldn't affect negotiated rates, though. For example, if you have a $1000 deductible, you will have to pay for 10 visits of the $100 negotiated rate before other benefits start. Those benefits could be something like insurance will now pay 80% of the cost of your visit. If you choose self pay, you CANNOT apply it to your deductible, because you are paying as though you do not have insuranceLet me give you a specific example for all of this put together. My dermatologist has a self pay rate of $130. I elected to use my insurance - his office bills them $111, of which the negotiated rate is $95.77. So using my insurance is cheaper than self pay. My deductible is $5000, so I don't have any additional benefits until I've filled that.Lastly, check to see if you're employer has options for Health Savings Accounts. You can have money taken out of your paycheck pre-tax that can be used to pay for those out-of-pocket medical expenses. For example, I can have $100 per month put into my HSA. Post-tax is about 80% in my state which doesn't have income tax, yours may be more. That's like a free $20 every month!TL;DR - Insurance is complicated, all the crap above IS a tl;dr.If there are any insurance specialists here, please correct me if there are any inaccuracies.
Girls Blog 2015
Submitted by radtechphotogirl