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Letter: Know your blood-test options

The good news: Aspen Valley Hospital is offering blood tests for $25 through May and June.

The bad news: The test will actually cost you $371 if ordered by your Aspen Valley Hospital cardiologist as part of your annual checkup. (A reasonable patient might think that the $25 test would be part of the $400-plus fee for the annual checkup. That would be wrong.)

So, if you are going to have any physician look at an Aspen Valley Hospital blood test, don’t let them order it for you. Go to the health fair. Otherwise, you are on the hook for about $400 for a $25 test — in addition to your referring doctor’s fees. By way of explanation, Karen from Aspen Valley Hospital billing informed me testily, “We need to make money. We can’t stay in business if we don’t make money,” which, charmingly, is also the motto of the local payday lender. Only he is more upfront about his “extra services.”



Kevin Patrick Ward

Snowmass Village