The medical center estimates that another 34 percent of the intentional injury charges remain on its books as an unpaid balance. That means only 11 percent of the charges for injuries caused by violence from 1998 were paid nearly two years later. In general, about 53 percent of our charges get reimbursed by somebody. Clearly in this population, it's less than that. This isn't just a problem facing Detroit hospitals, either.
Violence also drains the resources of suburban hospitals, too.
It could not determine how much more of that was written off as an uncollectable loss. And each penny counts in the current financial climate, hospitals said. He found that hospitals received payment on only 59 percent of the charges they billed patients, insurers or government social programs for providing trauma and critical care. Between 1986 and 1992, a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association estimated that 16 percent of the nation's trauma care centers closed because of the unpaid costs of intentional and accidental injuries. That publication calls on medicine to adopt strategies to reduce intentional injuries.