{"id":295,"date":"2012-02-05T10:38:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-05T14:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/?p=295"},"modified":"2012-02-05T10:38:00","modified_gmt":"2012-02-05T14:38:00","slug":"medical-debts-put-patients-at-risk-of-financial-collapse-detroit-free-press-freep-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/?p=295","title":{"rendered":"Medical debts put patients at risk of financial collapse | Detroit Free Press | freep.com"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.freep.com\/article\/20120205\/FEATURES08\/202050315\/Medical-debts-put-patients-at-risk-of-financial-collapse\">Medical debts put patients at risk of financial collapse | Detroit Free Press | freep.com<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Frances Giordano found out she had lung cancer in June. After that, the bad news just kept coming.<\/p>\n<p>First, she discovered that even with a good job and health insurance, her medical expenses were more than she could afford on disability.<\/p>\n<p>Then she started slipping into debt, like millions of other Americans who don&#8217;t have the cash to cover their medical bills. Hospitals expect to be paid promptly and offer little leeway to insured patients. Unpaid bills go to collection agencies, damaging a person&#8217;s credit history for years.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, she learned that fighting for her life was not her only battle or maybe even her toughest. When she finished her chemotherapy in December, she was fired. &#8220;Due to changes in business operations,&#8221; wrote her employer of more than six years, &#8220;we can no longer hold your position open.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>It arrived nine days before Christmas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m a good person,&#8221; the 58-year-old Giordano said. &#8220;I worked hard. Isn&#8217;t having cancer enough?&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8211; Sent using Google Toolbar<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Medical debts put patients at risk of financial collapse | Detroit Free Press | freep.com: Frances Giordano found out she had lung cancer in June. After that, the bad news &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/?p=295\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Medical debts put patients at risk of financial collapse | Detroit Free Press | freep.com&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,23,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anecdote-off","category-access-to-treatment","category-rationing-health-care"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cmhughesmd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}