CLEVELAND — Among the Cleveland Clinic patients receiving an email last week alerting them to a change in hospital policy regarding copays, requiring them to pay up front for non-emergency visits beginning June 1, or they wouldn't be seen, were members of the Cleveland City Council.
Watch more about the copay announcement:
"This is a direct attack on people in the middle class and lower class," said Councilman Richard Starr, who added the council had no clue of the Clinic's intention before those emails went out last week and believes it's something that should have been discussed with city leaders.
"But now you just make a decision, make a change, and now you want us as leaders to sit back and say that is it? Well, where's the relationship, where's the collaboration?" he said.
He expressed concerns to Cleveland Clinic executives, who met with the council on Monday to share their reasons behind the move. Reasons that Starr said included the fact that the system had tens of millions of dollars in unpaid copays last year alone. News 5 reached out to the hospital system, as we did last week, to ask if someone could share those reasons with us, but we were told no one would be available for an interview.
We asked Starr if he got any indication in that meeting that they would be open to discussion or if he felt this was pretty much set in stone.
"It was a tough conversation but it's also a conversation that sparked opportunities for us to grow," Starr said "but at the end of the day I believe the Clinic is going to do what they are trying to do with this policy and I'm almost certain that there will be potential lawsuits coming out after this from different people who are involved with it because this doesn't make sense."
An injunction was filed in the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas asking the court to stay the June 1 implementation of the policy.
"Under certain Ohio administrative codes and the revised codes, there should be a 30-day notice, so that was a red flag to me," said Cassandra McDonald, a law and policy analyst, pointing out the email went out to patients with only an 18-day notice.
"So I'm hoping that something falls through where either this implementation date is pushed back or that it's not there at all," she said. "I do agree that copayment should be paid when due, but I also agree that financial hardship should be taken into consideration, even creating a program to put patients on payment plans or increase HCAP eligibility, which would be more beneficial and cost-effective for everyone overall."
Following the copay announcement, we spoke to members of the community and got their thoughts on it. Watch below:
RELATED: Cleveland Clinic's copay policy change has News 5 viewers seeking answers on what it means to them
