Most people who suffer serious medical problems can incur hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills and if you don’t have health insurance, it’s impossible to afford that.

If that wasn’t enough, you never really know how much your medical bills are going to be until months after the procedure. The way hospitals and medical providers bill creates confusion. Oftentimes, you may not get a bill for months alerting you to an issue, and if you don’t pay it promptly, the medical provider sends it to collections and begins reporting on your credit.

The good news is, bankruptcy allows you to discharge and wipe out all of your medical debt. The hardest part about dealing with medical debt in bankruptcy is making sure you get a list of all the debt you have. In a lot of cases, the medical debt may not be reporting on your credit so pulling a credit report isn’t good enough.

I always recommend that each of my clients contact the hospital/medical provider’s billing department to get a detailed breakdown of their bills to ensure that they get all of their medical creditors listed.

The other complication with medical debt and bankruptcy is when you are still seeing the doctor. This can create tension between and negatively impact the relationship. The first question to ask is, are you okay with finding a new doctor? If the answer is yes, then don’t worry about it. However, if the answer is no, then you likely will want to resume payments to your current provider.