"High performance network" health care insurance plans leave patients with unexpected medical debt

A Tennessee family faced a potentially catastrophic situation when Joe Smith — a husband and father of four — was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm. Smith, of Chattanooga, had health insurance through his job with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois, but the insurance company refused to pay for the surgery necessary to prevent a life-threatening rupture. 

"We knew that he kind of had this ticking time bomb in his head," Stacie Smith, Joe's wife, said. 

The insurer claimed that the neurosurgeon that Smith's family had chosen was out of the network, and the plan had no coverage for out-of-network doctors and hospitals.