A hospital is Mississippi is being called out for its aggressive debt collection practices of suing patients with unpaid medical debts, which is also being used to call for reforming how medical debts are collected in the state, including limiting the monthly payments for patients with unpaid debts owed to a hospital to 5% of their incomes.
The hospital being called out is St. Dominic in Jackson, Miss. The hospital reportedly used a pair of collection agencies to file 3,400 lawsuits between 2018 and 2020 against individuals with unpaid medical debts. The agencies are accused in the report of not always following the hospital’s debt collection policy of forgiving debts to individuals who meet the requirements for the hospital’s financial assistance programs. The hospital’s policy is that anyone making less than 200% of the federal poverty limit should have qualified for free medical care, according to the media report.
The report indicated that the two collection agencies used by the hospital did not return requests for comment.
To address the problems cited in the report, consumer advocates and healthcare professionals were asked for recommendations to reduce the number of patients who are sued for unpaid medical debts.
Among the recommendations was one that would limit the amount of medical debt that a patient would be able to accrue at a hospital and then capping the monthly payment required to service unpaid debts at 5% of the patient’s income. It was also recommended to cap the interest rate charged on unpaid medical debts.
Hospitals in Colorado, Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, New York, Tennessee, Kansas, Maryland, and Wisconsin — as well as nationwide hospital networks — have all accused of being “too aggressive” by filing lawsuits to collect on unpaid debts. Many hospitals have stopped filing collection lawsuits and enforcing judgments as a result of the publicity. Earlier this year, UVA Hospital in Virginia announced it was wiping out many of its outstanding liens and judgments dating back to the 1990s, a move that was expected to impact tens of thousands of families.