{"id":822,"date":"2025-11-25T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-11-25T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.margatelm.com\/?p=822"},"modified":"2025-11-28T13:15:46","modified_gmt":"2025-11-28T13:15:46","slug":"not-serious-enough-to-turn-on-the-siren-toddlers-39-mile-ambulance-ride-still-cost-over-9000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.margatelm.com\/index.php\/2025\/11\/25\/not-serious-enough-to-turn-on-the-siren-toddlers-39-mile-ambulance-ride-still-cost-over-9000\/","title":{"rendered":"Not Serious Enough To Turn on the Siren, Toddler\u2019s 39-Mile Ambulance Ride Still Cost Over $9,000"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elisabeth Yoder\u2019s son, Darragh, was 15 months old in August when he developed what at first looked to his parents like hand, foot, and mouth disease. The common viral infection<\/a> generally clears up in less than a week, but Darragh\u2019s condition worsened over several days. His skin turned bright red. Blisters gave way to skin peeling off his face.<\/p>\n

An online search of his symptoms suggested he had staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome,<\/a> a serious bacterial infection. Yoder drove the toddler from their home in the small town of Mechanicsburg, Ohio, to the Mercy Health hospital in nearby Urbana.<\/p>\n

Staff in the emergency room there quickly confirmed that Darragh had scalded skin syndrome and said he needed to be taken by a private company\u2019s ambulance to Dayton Children\u2019s, a hospital about 40 miles away.<\/p>\n

\u201cI asked them: \u2018Can I take him? Can I drive him?\u2019\u201d Yoder said. \u201cAnd they were like, \u2018Oh, absolutely not.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

So, Yoder and her son got into the ambulance, with Darragh strapped in his car seat. The ambulance driver didn\u2019t turn on the siren or drive particularly fast, Yoder said. The trip took about 40 minutes, she said. \u201cIt was fairly straightforward transportation from Point A to Point B.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yoder had heard that ambulance rides can be pricey. But she didn\u2019t know how much her son\u2019s ride would cost.<\/p>\n

Darragh was hospitalized for three days and recovered from the illness.<\/p>\n

Then the bill came.<\/p>\n

The Medical Procedure<\/strong><\/p>\n

During the ride, the ambulance crew monitored Darragh\u2019s vitals and an intravenous line, inserted at the hospital, carrying fluids and antibiotics, but he received no other medical treatment, Yoder said.<\/p>\n

The Final Bill<\/strong><\/p>\n

$9,250, which included a \u201cbase rate\u201d charge of $6,600 for a \u201cspecialty care transport\u201d and a mileage fee of $2,340, calculated at $60 for each of the ride\u2019s 39 miles. It also included $250 for use of an intravenous infusion pump and $60 for monitoring Darragh\u2019s blood oxygen.<\/p>\n

The Problem: No Insuran<\/strong>ce, Few Protections<\/strong><\/p>\n

The children\u2019s hospital charged only about $3,000 more for the toddler\u2019s three-day stay than the ambulance company charged for the ride, Yoder said.<\/p>\n

Darragh\u2019s family doesn\u2019t have health insurance, leaving them on the hook for the full charges. Their income is a bit too high for them to qualify for Medicaid, the public health program that covers low-income residents, or for the Ohio Children\u2019s Health Insurance Program, which covers moderate-income kids.<\/p>\n

The Yoders belong to a Christian health care sharing ministry, with members paying into a fund that helps reimburse them for medical bills.<\/p>\n

Unlike health insurance, such arrangements do not offer members negotiated rates with ambulance companies or other medical providers. And there are no state or federal billing protections that would help an uninsured patient in Ohio with a ground ambulance bill.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The federal No Surprises Act protects those with insurance from large bills for air ambulance transportation provided outside their insurers\u2019 network agreements. But ground ambulance services aren\u2019t covered<\/a> by the law \u2014 and even if they were, that wouldn\u2019t have helped the Yoders, since they didn\u2019t have insurance.<\/p>\n

Patricia Kelmar, the senior director of health care campaigns for PIRG<\/a>, a national advocacy group, said ambulance charges vary widely. She said she\u2019s seen per-mile charges ranging from less than $30 to more than $80, as well as base rates that differ dramatically.<\/p>\n

Some patients, such as those with traumatic injuries, need ambulances with highly trained staff and advanced medical equipment, Kelmar said, so it makes sense that those rides would be more expensive. But patients rarely are told what the ride will cost until they receive a bill.<\/p>\n

Jennifer Robinson, a spokesperson for Mercy Health, said she couldn\u2019t comment on a specific patient\u2019s case but said the staff follows established medical standards. \u201cWhen a patient requires a higher level of treatment, ambulance transfer between facilities is best practice to ensure appropriate care,\u201d she said in an email to KFF Health News.<\/p>\n

Kimberly Godden, a vice president for the ambulance company, Superior Ambulance Service, said a doctor at the first hospital requested a high-level transport for the patient, requiring specially trained staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur priority is always to ensure patients receive the highest-quality care when they need it most, and we respond to every call regardless of a patient\u2019s ability to pay,\u201d Godden said in an email. \u201cSuperior had the team and resources available to quickly and safely move the patient to the higher level of care they needed within the time frame set by the ordering physician.\u201d<\/p>\n

Godden said the company would offer a \u201ccharity care\u201d rate to Yoder if the family qualified for it.<\/p>\n

The Resolution<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yoder said she repeatedly discussed the bill with ambulance company representatives, including the option for charity care. They told Yoder the best deal they could offer was to reduce the total by about 40%, to $5,600, if the family paid it in a lump sum, she said.<\/p>\n

After months of discussion, the family wound up agreeing to that deal, Yoder said. They put the charge on a new credit card, which gave them 17 months to pay it off with no interest.<\/p>\n

They have agreed to payment plans with the two hospitals, which offered charity care discounts that dropped the bills to a total of about $6,800.<\/p>\n

The Yoders expect the sharing ministry to reimburse them for about 75% of the payments they\u2019re making to the hospitals and the ambulance service.<\/p>\n

The Takeaway<\/strong><\/p>\n

Patients and their families should feel comfortable asking hospital staffers whether a recommended ambulance company is in their insurance network and how much the ride to another location will cost, said Kelmar, a national expert on such bills. \u201cShouldn\u2019t the hospital know that?\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s that heavy of a lift.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kelmar said she doesn\u2019t want to discourage people from taking an ambulance if a doctor says it\u2019s necessary. Once consumers receive a bill for the service, she said, they often can negotiate the price down. It can help to look up what the ambulance service accepts as payment from government programs. Those rates are often much lower than the full-price charges patients see on a bill.<\/p>\n

If the family had been covered by Ohio\u2019s Medicaid program, the ambulance service would have been paid much less than it charged the Yoders. The public health program pays ambulance services a $413 base rate<\/a> for \u201cspecialty care transports,\u201d plus $5.05 per mile. Those rates would have added up to $609.95 for the transportation part of Darragh\u2019s ambulance ride.<\/p>\n

Yoder said she wishes she had driven Darragh straight to the children\u2019s hospital. If she had skipped the local ER, she said, they would have arrived at the bigger hospital sooner and she would have saved thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n

But she didn\u2019t feel as if she had a choice about putting her son in the ambulance, she said. The doctor told her it was necessary, and the hospital staff had already inserted an intravenous line. \u201cI wasn\u2019t going to pull out his IV line and just leave,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Yoder said she remains uninsured because she hasn\u2019t seen any private insurance options that suit her family\u2019s circumstances. No matter who pays the ambulance bill, she thinks the charges were much too high. She understands that patients can often negotiate discounts, she said, \u201cbut you shouldn\u2019t have to work so hard for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Bill of the Month is a crowdsourced investigation by\u00a0<\/em>KFF Health News<\/em><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>The Washington Post\u2019s Well+Being<\/em><\/a>\u00a0that dissects and explains medical bills.\u00a0Since 2018, this series has helped many patients and readers get their medical bills reduced, and it has been cited in statehouses, at the U.S. Capitol, and at the White House. Do you have a confusing or outrageous medical bill you want to share?\u00a0<\/em>Tell us about it<\/em><\/a>!<\/em><\/p>\n

KFF Health News<\/a> is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF\u2014an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF<\/a>.<\/p>\n

USE OUR CONTENT<\/h3>\n

This story can be republished for free (details<\/a>).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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