<prompt> Human: I recently incurred a knee injury playing a sport and broke my left patella. This is my first major medical need as a 29 year old on my own insurance plan. I have a bronze-tiered plan with a 6k deductible with 50 coinsurance after the deductible is met. I also have accidental insurance with Aflac and an additional insurance policy through my players association. I have been in contact with both and have claims filed already.The night of my injury, I went to the ER and upon leaving, I paid 100 deposit. A few days later, I paid a copay for approximately 1k to the ER hospital. I have yet to receive an itemized bill for this, so I am unsure if my personal expenses here are done? Can anyone confirm this?Six days later, I met with an orthopedic specialist. He looked at my x-rays, did a few simple mobility tests and was certain I was sentenced to surgery to repair my knee cap. He scheduled me for outpatient surgery at another hospital near by much better and larger facility two days later. I paid the ortho a copay of approximately 1,600 for the upcoming surgery. He said this cost was due to the health insurance companys contracted rates. I was sort of relieved at this point, even though I hadnt met my deductible, I had to dish out some cash but nowhere near what I thought I would...yet.The next day, the new hospital called and asked for a copay of about 2.6k for the outpatient service. Okay...a little frustrating, still not too upset.One day later, I had surgery to wire up my fractured patella. It is now four days after surgery and I called both the ER and OR hospitals for itemized bills. The hospital in which surgery was performed had a grand total of almost 65k. I have yet to receive my itemized bill from the ER hospital they seem slow. The itemized bill for surgery has me absolutely floored. I thought I had a basic understanding of my health insurance, what and how is covered, and so on and so forth, but since this bill is now sitting in front of me with the price tag that it has, I cant help but think I have just been blindsided by my own naivety or lack of education on the topic. Am I doomed? Am I responsible for covering my deductible and then paying half of this 65k bill plus whatever is still to come from the ER? Am I worrying too much before all of the dust settles and health insurance takes care of it?Assistant: I would guess that you should have a maximum out of pocket this is in the range of 12K to 14K in my state for a bronze plan.You should hopefully be able to go online to your insurance companys website and see all of the claims filed against your plan. They should have a pretty good breakdown. You should also be able to see your Explanation of Benefits, which will say what your maximum out-of-pocket is.Be thorough when reviewing your claims. If you have any questions, call the insurance andor the hospital. For example, hospitals love to fuck people over that have surgery by having some third party across the country monitor you whatever that means, so they can squeeze every dime out of you.Human: My out of pocket maximum is about 7k.Assistant: Then thats all you have to pay. Human: For covered charges. Non covered on the other hand... A month later you find out that your in network surgical center used an anesthesiologist who is out of network, and the surgeon who was working on you called in a second set of eyes who also happens to be a non contacted provider. Abra cadabra youre responsible for your 7k in covered charges as well as 10k in non covered charges.Assistant: But I wasnt involved in deciding or choosing an anesthesiologist? Regardless of how screwed up anyone thinks our health care system is, with the current landscape, how is it even okay to just throw a doctor in the room and not give you the choice to say yes or get another doctor that is covered under your insurance. Ugh.  <response>: I fought my insurance company over this exact situation and eventually they backed down. But first they tried collecting from me and you cant blame them since most people just pay out of fear. 