In the second episode of our special series on medical debt, we explore lessons from Oregon’s aggressive legislation to push hospitals to prevent patients from falling into medical debt.
When Oregon passed an ambitious medical debt prevention law in 2023, the state was charting new territory.
Just two states had passed similar rules to require hospitals to screen and provide more patients with financial aid, a policy known as presumptive eligibility. And those laws were narrower than what Oregon pushed through.
Hospitals in Oregon would now have to screen nearly all patients for financial aid. No bill could go out the door until hospitals had knocked down or wiped out what eligible patients owed.
As we explained in the first episode of