Patients Rising

Patients Rising reviewed 187 bankruptcy filings across Colorado and uncovered a troubling connection between medical debt and hospitals participating in the federal 340B drug discount program. More than half of the filings included debt owed to a 340B hospital system, accounting for nearly $http://1.5 million in verified balances. The cases revealed a recurring pattern of patients carrying overwhelming debt from a single hospital system, fragmented billing that turned one medical event into multiple financial obligations and rural families facing additional costs tied to long-distance care and emergency transport.

As hospitals receive federal discounts intended to strengthen care for vulnerable patients, the Colorado findings raise important questions about affordability, transparency and whether those resources are translating into meaningful financial relief for the people the program was designed to serve.

Read more about our investigation into Colorado here:

What 187 Colorado Bankruptcy Filings Reveal | 340B Hospital Debt Patients Rising reviewed 187 Colorado bankruptcy filings: 86% involved medical debt and more than half were tied to federal 340B hospitals.

Wisconsin presents the most concentrated medical-bankruptcy pattern in our six-state series. Across 104 individual Chapter 7 and Chapter 13 filings from the Eastern and Western Districts of Wisconsin in January and February 2024 — just two months — the data shows the highest 340B exposure rate, the highest medical-debt rate, the densest verified-340B dollar accumulation per unit of time, and the most concentrated single-system dominance of any state we have examined.

Read our report here:

What 104 Wisconsin Bankruptcy Filings Reveal | 340B Hospital Debt Aurora Health Care appears on 48 of 104 Wisconsin bankruptcy filings. A two-month review of $1.16M in 340B hospital debt and what it reveals.