DENVER — In February, Norma Brambila’s teenage daughter wrote her a letter she now carries in her purse. It is a drawing of a rose, and a note encouraging Brambila to “keep fighting” her sickness and reminding...

California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced Monday that he is throwing his weight behind legislation to bar medical debt from showing up on consumer credit reports, a Democratic-led effort to offer protection to patients...

When President Barack Obama signed legislation in 2010 to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, he said the new agency had one priority: “looking out for people, not big banks, not lenders, not investment...

Some hospitals sue patients who can’t afford to pay their medical bills. Such lawsuits don’t tend to bring in much money for the hospital but can really harm patients already experiencing financial hardships. In this...

In 2023, our nationwide reporting team has been hard at work on a holiday gift to you: a packet of advice for navigating the labyrinthine American medical system. In the sixth year of KFF Health News-NPR’s “Bill of...

Some hospitals sue patients over unpaid medical bills in bulk, sometimes by the hundreds of thousands. The defendants are often already facing financial hardship or even bankruptcy. Judgments against patients in these suits can...

Across the country, Americans are losing their homes, emptying their retirement accounts, and struggling to feed and clothe their families because of medical debt. For two years, KFF Health News and NPR have been investigating...

Sharon Woodward used to travel the country as a medical technician. She made good money and prided herself on her skills. But in her mid-40s, Woodward retired after being diagnosed with a debilitating form of arthritis. Her...

In 2019, emergency medicine physician and historian Luke Messac was working as a medical resident. He had heard about hospitals suing their own patients over unpaid medical bills, so he decided to investigate whether the...

The share of American consumers with medical debt on their credit reports has declined dramatically over the past year as major credit rating agencies removed small unpaid bills and debts that were less than a year old,...

Ron Irby expected the artificial knee implanted in his right leg in September 2018 would last two decades — perhaps longer. Yet in just three years, the Optetrak implant manufactured by Exactech in Gainesville, Florida, had worn...

The Biden administration announced a major initiative to protect Americans from medical debt on Thursday, outlining plans to develop federal rules barring unpaid medical bills from affecting patients’ credit scores. The...

DENVER — Kayce Atencio used to be haunted by a thought while working at a homeless shelter in downtown Denver. “It could have been me,” said Atencio, 30, who lives in a small apartment with his son and daughter not...

For people with cystic fibrosis, like Sabrina Walker, Trikafta has been a life-changer. Before she started taking the drug, she would wind up in the hospital for weeks at a time until antibiotics could eliminate the infections...

PUEBLO, Colo. — As 41% of American adults face medical debt, residents of this southern Colorado city contend their local nonprofit hospitals aren’t providing enough charity care to justify the millions in tax breaks they...

North Carolina hospitals — led by the state’s largest public medical system — have sued thousands of their patients since 2017, according to a new analysis that sheds additional light on the aggressive tactics U.S....

For Emily Boller, it was a $5,000 hospital bill for a simple case of pink eye that took four years to pay off. For Mary Curley, it was the threatening collection letters from a lab that arrived more than 2½ years later, just as...