My uncle had emergency heart surgery. Bill over half a million. They "reduced" it in half. He installed flooring, only making 30K a year... and his doctor told him if he did his work, he could die. Hospital said there was nothing else they could do if he couldn't meet what they said were minimum monthly payments (I think they wanted it paid in less than a year). He filed bankruptcy because of it.

This is a common story where I was (Indiana).

Edit due to forgotten information.