Hispanic Group Announces Major Settlement With HMA Hospitals

Consejo de Latinos Unidos, a national non-profit organization that educates and assists uninsured Hispanics and others, announced today that the Consejo was able to secure a "golden fair pricing policy" for the uninsured with Health Management Associates (HMA), the third largest for-profit hospital system in the nation.

"This victory for the uninsured would not have happened without the outstanding legal work of nationally recognized healthcare attorney Archie Lamb," said K.B. Forbes, Executive Director of the Consejo. "In 2004, we established an alliance with Lamb to help those who did not have a voice — uninsured minorities. Today, together, we can claim a resounding victory for uninsured patients and applaud HMA for turning a potential black eye into a golden fair pricing policy."

Under the settlement, uninsured patients who receive services from an HMA facility will now be charged the average managed care rate by hospital. When calculating the average managed care rate, the rate will be weighed by the volume of business that each managed care company provides to the HMA hospital. "The average rate being weighed accordingly establishes a truly fair and equitable pricing structure," said Forbes. According to published reports, HMA will offer discounts and refunds of up to 60 percent.

Hospitals traditionally have charged uninsured patients three or four or five times more than what they would accept as payment in full from an insurance company. Jose Manuel Quintana, who contacted the Consejo in 2003 and attended a Consejo workshop in Miami, was charged $3,040 by an HMA hospital after visiting the hospital for chest pain. An insurance company would have paid no more that $1,000 for the exact same care. Quintana was the class representative in the class action lawsuit that was filed in 2005 by Lamb.