As long as patients are forced to pay bigger share of their medical bills, bad debt will remain a cause of concern for the healthcare providers. Even when the patients gain insurance coverage under the healthcare reform, the patients still end up paying major chunk of their medical bills.
Although the healthcare industry is least affected by the recession, it is still not immune to more careful spending. These days, more and more patients are paying out-of-pocket instead of being covered by third-party payers.