ECU Health and the national nonprofit Undue Medical Debt have partnered for a second round of medical debt relief for qualifying patients.
This newest round of medical debt relief will help eliminate more than $550 million worth of past-due hospital medical debt for more than 139,000 qualifying patients.
Debt relief letters in Undue Medical Debt branded envelopes are starting to arrive and will continue arriving over the next 12 months on a rolling basis given the size of this relief effort.
Eligible community members do not need to apply, and there is no application process.
Instead, community members who qualify for this one-time debt relief will receive a branded letter from Undue Medical Debt indicating which past-due hospital debt or debts have been eliminated.
Undue Medical Debt works with hospital systems and other providers across the country to purchase past due medical debt belonging to those least able to pay in large portfolios for pennies or less on the dollar and then erases the debt.
ECU Health’s collaboration with Undue Medical Debt predates North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services’ medical debt relief initiative which spans all hospitals in the state and lays out a plan for medical debt relief coupled with changes to Medicaid/Medicare reimbursement policy and financial aid standards in 2025.
The two organizations collaborated in December 2024 to eliminate more than $186 million worth of past-due hospital medical debt for more than 32,000 qualifying patients.
Under Undue Medical Debt guidelines, those who qualify for this medical debt relief have hospital medical debts that are 5 percent or more than their annual income or earn at or below four times poverty-level income.
The current federal poverty level is an annual income of under $31,200 for a family of four which means a qualifying family of four would make under $124,800.
Community members do not need to take any action, as the eligible hospital medical debt will automatically be eliminated for those who qualify.
“We are once again proud to be partnering with ECU Health, which understands the burden created by medical debts on those patients in the community least able to pay,” said Undue Medical Debt CEO and president Allison Sesso. “Needing care increasingly creates economic anxiety for so many families and ECU Health appreciates that patient health and wellbeing are intimately connected to access, which is why we’re so proud that all told over 171,000 ECU Health patients in eastern North Carolina will have over $736 million of medical debt erased, reducing financial and mental stress and encouraging them to re-engage with the healthcare system.”
The collaboration with Undue Medical Debt is one of many ways in which ECU Health is living its mission to improve the health and well-being of eastern North Carolina.
The initiative aligns with the health system’s commitment to serving underserved communities in the East, many of which have disproportionate numbers of low-income and uninsured or underinsured people.
The initiative is also in alignment with ECU Health’s long-standing practice of non-predatory billing practices, which emphasize charity care, zero-interest payment plans, transparent pricing and dedicated resources to help patients navigate financial requirements.
“At ECU Health, our commitment to our mission and patients is at the heart of all we do,” said ECU Health Chief Operating Officer Brian Floyd. “This latest collaboration with Undue Medical Debt will make an enormous impact on so many in our largely underserved region. We could not be more thankful to Undue Medical Debt, which shares our vision for making high-quality rural health care accessible here in eastern North Carolina.”
