Fort Collins Woman Charged $4,500 for Routine Scan at ER

When Fort Collins resident Helen Cowen began feeling pain in her chest, she tried to go to the doctor for a check-up.

But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, her doctor turned her away because her visit was deemed non-essential.

Instead, the doctor advised her to visit the emergency room to find out was going on.

According to The Denver Channel, Cowen went to the ER at Banner Health in Fort Collins and received a CT scan, blood work, an EKG scan, and x-rays.

Thankfully, the test results revealed that she had a healthy heart. Unfortunately, her bill for those tests came to a total of $4,500.

"I wish they would have told me upfront how much this was actually going to be costing me. I would have just left," Cowen told the station. "...I did not have a choice to go to the emergency room. I wonder if this has happened to anybody else during this pandemic that they couldn't see the doctors."

It will take over two years to pay off the bill with her current insurance plan, but Cowen's story is not in vain — she hopes that others will learn from her experience, and she plans to continue speaking out about what happened to her.