Financial Policy / Insurance Issues

Great Lakes Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery accepts assignment from Medicare and from several private insurance carriers including Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan and Priority Health. 

FINANCIAL AND INSURANCE POLICY

Insurance status is never a reason to prevent anyone from being treated by our physicians.

Surgical patients: Please be aware that you may receive bills from several different providers for your surgery, such as the hospital, anesthesiologist, radiologist, or another specialist. A bill from our office represents the procedures performed by your Surgeon.

If you do not have health insurance coverage:

• Payment for the office visit, consultation or vascular ultrasound evaluation is expected the day the service is provided.
• You will receive an estimate of proposed surgical charges and will be expected to contact our billing office to make suitable financial arrangements, including a down payment, prior to your surgery.
• If you were first seen in the hospital on an emergent basis, please contact our billing office to discuss acceptable payment arrangements immediately.

If you have health insurance, please understand that insurance is an agreement between you and your insurance carrier and that we are not a part of that agreement. At all times, you are responsible for the full amount of your bill, regardless of the status of the insurance claim.

Our physicians participate with Medicare, Blue Cross/ Blue Shield of Michigan and Priority Health.

You are responsible to:

• Verify with your insurance carrier that services performed or proposed by our office are covered under your individual plan. We suggest you contact the customer service telephone number listed on your insurance card prior to being seen in our office.
• Obtain any authorizations or referrals required by your insurance carrier.
• Pay our office for any deductible, co-payment or non-covered charges.

We will bill your insurance carrier as a courtesy to you and accept direct payment from your insurance company. We will mail a bill to you for the amount you owe us, which may be for a deductible, co-payment, non-covered charges or if we have not received any response from your insurance carrier after submitting 2 claims. If you feel your insurance should have paid for a service, you should contact your insurance carrier for resolution. We expect payment within 25 days after we mail a bill to you.

Should you need to make payment arrangements or have a question regarding your bill, please call our billing office. We are more than willing to work with you to resolve your balance. However, delinquent accounts will be referred to a professional agency and/or attorney for collection.

We require 48 hours advance notice to cancel an appointment without charge. Appointments cancelled without 48 hours notice will be subject to a $25.00 fee which will be billed directly to you, not to your insurance carrier. A $25.00 service charge will be assessed for any returned check.

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