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It is illegal to deny a person necessary medical treatment solely because they do not have insurance coverage.
A hospital which is found to have refused necessary stabilization and care is subject to a $20,000 (might have gone up to $30K) per incident fine. And once a violation is identified, records get audited to determine if other instances exist. The fines may be levied against a facility and/or the physician responsible. (I know of at least one VERY pissed off doc that this happened to ... it's mandated that any hospital receiving a patient who was refused stabilization/treatment because of lack of coverage report that to the feds, because that hospital is subject to the SAME FINE if they don't report.)
It's called EMTALA, and it's a world of hurt for a hospital ... not just because of the fine ... because of the danger that the hospital will lose ALL ABILITY to accept any payments from Medicare. Forever.
It's taken pretty seriously.
Any uninsured/underinsured patient can apply for Medical Assistance (aka Medicaid) while hospitalized. The purpose is for the hospital to pursue a 'limited use' application to cover costs of that hospitalization. The patient can follow up with the welfare office after discharge with the possibility of receiving full benefits if the meet the requirements.
If the MA application does not get approved, the same document can be used to apply for other funding sources, including monies earmarked for this use by the county.
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