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For Americans without adequate insurance who can't afford to pay for health care, hospital community benefit programs can be a life-saving resource. Non-profit hospitals' obligation to provide community benefits including charity care, is rooted in their tax-exempt status. Taxpayers support these hospitals through tax breaks worth billions of dollars every year. In exchange for this support, nonprofit hospitals are supposed to help their communities by working with them to identify and address the most pressing health care needs of the people they serve. When these programs work properly, hospitals and communities partner to meet longstanding health needs.
Unfortunately, not all hospitals have been doing their fair share. Some fail to notify patients that charity care exists or provide it to those truly in need. Others overcharge self-pay patients, require them to make significant upfront payments before allowing them to access care, use aggressive practices to collect debts; or ignore vital community health needs.
National health reform will provide coverage to millions of Americans, but effective hospital community benefit programs will still be critical to providing timely, affordable care and to addressing broader community health issues.
- May 08, 2013 Testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Jessica Curtis, director of the Hospital Accountability Project, testified before a field hearing chaired by Senator Al Franken regarding “Ensuring Patients’ Access to Care and Privacy: Are Federal Laws Protecting Patients?”
- May 05, 2010 Best Kept Secrets: Are Non-Profit Hospitals Informing Patients About Charity Care Programs? This report from The Access Project and Community Catalyst show that many non-profit hospitals are not doing enough to meet AHA guidelines to have clear, written policies to help patients determine if they qualify for charity care and to make these policies available to patients and the public.
- May 05, 2010 Summary of Hospital Accountability Provisions This outlines the four provisions in the new national health care reform law focused on non-profit hospitals, and how advocates can engage in making them effective.
- May 04, 2010 Map It: Free Care Compendium Visit our 50-state compendium of free care laws to find out whether there is a free care law in your state.
- August 25, 2008 Community Benefits: The Need for Action, an Opportunity for Health Care Change This community benefits workbook for advocates is an in-depth resource tool for advocates working to improve the community benefits programs offered by health care institutions in their communities.
- June 15, 2009 Find Out Firsthand This “how-to” guide to hospital monitoring tells you what you need to know to discover whether your local hospital is upfront about its charity care practices.
- August 03, 2008 Community Benefits Model Act Model legislation for advocates working to promote standards and oversight for community benefits offered by hospitals and health plans.
- August 03, 2008 Hospital Free Care Web Tool An interactive tool to help advocates build customized legislation providing standards and oversight for hospital financial assistance programs.
Community Catalyst’s Hospital Accountability Project views hospitals as vital partners in our health care system. We work with consumer advocates, hospital leaders, and policymakers to improve institutional practices and promote public policies that set clear community benefit standards and establish strong consumer protections in hospital charity care, billing and debt collection.
We support state and local advocates with policy expertise, advocacy tools and services that help them assess institutional and systemic problems, educate and involve community members, and engage hospitals and policymakers in finding solutions that work for the people they serve. We are administering funds from a cy pres award from the court settlement of a major class action lawsuit against Tenet Hospital Corporation to coalitions of advocacy groups in 15 states. We also currently work to promote federal policies that would set fair minimum standards for charity care and community benefits, particularly for non-profit hospitals.
In 2010, The Access Project and Community Catalyst entered into a collaboration to explore new initiatives regarding medical debt, hospital charity care and issues related to billing and collection.