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Can a Doctor Refuse to Treat a Patient Without Insurance?

Individuals may not have medical insurance for numerous reasons. It could be a matter of not being able to afford it, being unemployed, or waiting for a health coverage plan from a new job to begin. However, injuries are never considerate of your time and can occur when you least expect it. If you currently do not have insurance coverage, you may wonder if a doctor can refuse you  treatment because of this. The answer to this can vary by state and laws. Doctors actually have a legal authority to turn down a patient, but it is not always as simple as that. Every state has its own specific laws surrounding medical treatment and doctor refusal. However, if a doctor or hospital has turned you away as a patient because you do not have insurance you could potentially sue for compensation. This is mainly if your condition has seriously worsened due to the refusal of emergency treatment. A lawyer can review your specific case and help give an opinion regarding if you have any grounds for a lawsuit.

 

Doctors have the legal right to refuse service to any patient medical attention for many different reasons. The most common reasons are that patients are solely asking for narcotics because they are addicted to it, there is no illness visibly present in the patient, a patient is acting dangerous towards employees, or if the doctors office has no available openings or is not accepting patients at the time. Often times, patients are not actually denied the medical attention, but instead are forced to wait long periods of time to receive it. This occurs frequently emergency rooms, and it causes many individuals to just leave. These patients feel that they are being denied treatment, when actually they are just waiting a long time for a doctor to free up. Emergency room doctors have the legal obligation to see patients who are in dire emergency situations before anyone else, even those who have been sitting there longer. If you were to walk into a hospital emergency room with a broken leg and someone else walked in five minutes after you with a bullet wound, that person will always seen first.

 

Contact an Attorney

 

While a medical doctor has every legal right to deny medical attention to a patient, they are not allowed to refuse an individual with life threatening injury. You should consider contacting a personal injury lawyer such as the medical malpractice lawyer Salt Lake City UT locals turn to with any concerns or questions regarding the medical care that was denied to you.

 

Thanks to authors at Rasmussen Miner for insight into Personal Injury Law.