To all our sliding fee and self-pay patients:

All medical, mental health and dental department visit and procedure fees have been updated to ensure revenue maximization and to continue providing high-quality primary health care services to our patient population. These fee increases were effective October 1, 2009.  The health center must ensure that it remains financially viable so that it can continue to serve the needs of all of its patients for the short- and long-term. Health Care on the Square’s current financial issues made it necessary to adjust many fees immediately, and while some of the increases were significant, the updated fees still reflect our commitment to keeping health care affordable for everyone.

This is how the fee schedules will affect you, our patient:

• Instead of charging a flat fee for visits, a sliding fee discount (based on each patient’s family income and size and ranging from a Slide B medical visit co-pay of 65% to a 15% discount for a Slide C, D and E in dental) will be applied to the visit charge.

• All procedures – surgical procedures, in-house labs, x-rays, injections, supplies and the like – will be charged at cost.

• All outside labs that are sent to LabCorp will be billed directly from LabCorp and will be the responsibility of the patient.

We will continue to ask you to pay your co-pays and your portion of all charges at the time of your visit. Furthermore we ask that you pay your outstanding balances from previous visits. Our front-desk staff is available to help you with the latter.

We thank you for your understanding and cooperation while we implement these necessary changes, and we welcome your questions and feedback.