One of the things I have not seen much discussion about is getting cost reimbursed for the surgery when your insurance company does not cover it.

My insurance company was pretty clear they would not cover me, but my accountant said he could support filing for unreimbursed medical expenses.

This takes accurate and thorough accounting, but is well worth the effort.

We were able to get our airfare and hotel stays factored in as well as a significant portion of the surgery.

We were out of pocket approximately $45,000 and we received tax credits of over $35,000 which took a lot of the pain out of the process.

Since we paid our taxes in advance with estimated tax paymetns we received a large check back from both the state and the federal government...

People who are debating on whether to have the surgery or not should talk with their tax conultants to see what kind of relief they may be entitled to.

I do not know if tax bracket you are in makes a significant difference. We are a two income family so we paid a lot of taxes out befoer we got the money back...

I assume that what you can get back may be related to what you pay in but, I do not know for a fact how the formula works.

Your point is very well taken, as I did the same thing. For most of us, medical expenses are never large enough to deduct. You are only allowed to deduct the amount above 7.5% of your Adjusted Gross Income, and so since most people have medical insurance and their out of pocket expenses are limited to co-payments and prescriptions, they never pay out enough to really use the IRS deduction. My ADR surgery was just over $31,000 and I deducted every bit of it on my taxes (well, the amount that was over 7.5% of my Adjusted Gross Income). That was something like a $21,000 deduction and it led to a $9,000 refund, which meant my surgery actually cost $22,000 instead of $31,000. Since I am a CPA I was aware of the medical deduction rules, but anyone who has ADR surgery and has to pay for it themselves should definitely keep all their receipts and talk with their accountant.

Charles, you beat me to the punch! I believe this mirrors your comment.I spoke to a tax professional about this.

He suggests paying $45,000 medical expenses and getting back tax "credit" $35000 is impossible. It is likely that Cowboy meant a $35,000 tax "deduction?”

The IRS allows a medical deduction of your medical expense in excess of 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. If your adjusted gross income is $100,000, you can deduct $37,500 (=$45,000 - 7.5% of $100,000.) And the amount of tax saving ( = medical subsidy from Uncle Sam) depends on your tax bracket. If you are in the 28% tax bracket, you will receive tax saving of $10,500 (=$37,500 tax deduction * 28%).

So out of your total $45,000 medical expenses, $10,500 comes out of Uncle Sam's pocket and your net cost is $34,500.

Gotta run…

Actually I reviewed our tax files and the actual deduction included other medical expenses throughout the year.

so our deduction for unreimbursed medical expenses which did include hotels and air fare as well as co pays, physical therapy were closer to 55,000.00 for the year.

The net resiult our refund was close to $36,000. Keep in mind I lost two months of income so my tax basis was lower when you compared against the estiamted taxes paid in so essentially we did over pay which contributed tothe tax refund we received.

My point in this discussion is that the opportunity for getting credit back should not be overlooked.

Obviously everyone has a different starting point.

Great/impt. information. Thx ~ Allan