Glad this is coming up again. My family has had a lot of medical bills the last six years, hundreds of thousands of dollars going to insurance, (and quite a few tens of thousands going to me). I can comfortably state close to 10% of those bills are bogus. Whatever the reason, fraud, typo, honest mistake.

The first way to be proactive is to insist that the first time every nurse, doctor or specialist visits you they leave a biz card or signs a sheet on a clipboard you provide. This sheet has date/time, their name, position/department and how you will be billed, (i.e. a private practice or group medical organization like 'team physician').

The second way is when you get your bills you scour them for names you do not recognize or organizations that are not on your clipboard or business cards. Then fight it.

Paying $6 per OTC pill is annoying, getting a bill for $400 from a doctor who looked at your chart at the nurses station while you were asleep and billed you a full consult after scanning the pages, is criminal. Its happen to me once and my son a few times.

"I don't have your card (or your name is not on my sign in list), you prove to me you did what you said you did." Stops a lot of issues cold.