Who We Are

AMERICAN PATIENT RIGHTS ASSOCIATION

The American Patient Rights Association (APRA) is a non-profit consumer organization helping people to pay less for and avoid being harmed by their medical treatment. We’re fighting for the fair, safe, transparent, and affordable healthcare we all deserve. We are also fighting to stop preventable medical errors, the 3rd leading cause of death, and predatory medical billing, the leading cause of personal bankruptcy.

Membership in APRA is free and open to all. Register now to receive membership benefits.

APRA is independent, non-partisan, and not associated with nor influenced by any medical, health insurance or pharmaceutical organization or association, or any government department. 

We believe all patients should have a right to transparency, clarity, full disclosure, honesty, and truthfulness in all medical matters, which are too often missing from patient communications. APRA supports all medical facilities and practitioners that provide fair, safe, reasonable, and transparent medical services.

The APRA website is a unique resource for patients. It includes news, information, and alerts about medical facilities, treatments, medications, devices, insurance, and more, that threaten the safety or financial well-being of healthcare consumers, as well as tools that patients can use to protect themselves from physical and financial harm when receiving medical treatment.

APRA is empowering healthcare consumers by providing:

• • a voice for patients;
  • unbiased information and beneficial programs to help our members avoid financial hardship due to medical bills, the leading cause of bankruptcy. Seventy-two percent (72%) of patients bankrupted by medical bills have health insurance*; 
  • unbiased information and beneficial programs to help our members protect themselves and their families from preventable medical errors, which kill up to 440,000 hospital patients and injure millions more every year;
  • information to help our members protect themselves from being harmed by medical, pharmaceutical, and insurance organizations that put profit before patients.

*Study by Harvard University. Learn more. 

Register now to receive membership benefits.

Why a Patient Rights Association is Needed

All Americans should have the right to receive medical treatment but it is mainly a privilege that is only available to those who can afford it. All patients should be treated equally and fairly but they are not. Health equality and equity are serious issues affecting those who are Black, elderly, impoverished, disabled, and others. Everyone who receives medical care should be treated safely but instead, each patient must protect him or herself from unsafe treatment. Patients need transparency when seeking hospital treatment but there is none.

Corporate healthcare systems that prioritize profits over patients are growing larger and larger each year, buying up private practices and stifling competition, leaving fewer and fewer private doctors who put patients first. The medical-industrial complex successfully opposes any legislation that supports fair or safe medical treatment but could threaten corporate profits. 

Most patients are unaware that: 1) patient safety in hospitals is a major problem that has grown much worse since the pandemic; 2) approximately one in four seniors who are hospitalized will be harmed by an injury or illness that is unrelated to the illness or injury they are being treated for; 3) medical errors are the third leading cause of death; and, 4) medical bills are the leading cause of personal bankruptcy.

FACT:

APRA is fighting to stop the 3rd leading cause of death, preventable medical errors in hospitals.
APRA is developing solutions to help our members fight unreasonable and predatory medical bills.
APRA is developing solutions to make health care safer for all.
APRA seeks the cooperation of employers, healthcare organizations,  insurers, pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers, state and federal governments, and others in creating a fairer, safer, healthier America.

OUR PURPOSE

APRA was established to provide a voice for consumers in our healthcare system, to create a movement for fair, safe, transparent health care, and to provide a resource for people who wish to protect themselves and their families from preventable physical and financial harm when they seek medical care.

OUR MISSION

To provide the leadership, education, and advocacy for the right of healthcare consumers to receive safe, fair, transparent medical services and goods.

OUR VISION

Medical care for all that is free of preventable harm. ​

OUR MOTTOS

​Save Our Patients™ | Patients Before Profits ™ | Patient Power ™ | Treat Patients Safely ™U

We Depend on Gifts From People Like You 

We depend on donations to be able to help people protect themselves and their families when medical care is needed and to develop programs like the Patient’s Hospital Safety Guide, the Hospital Guide for COVID Patients, the Patient Safety Reporting System, and more. 

APRA is a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit organization. Federal EIN Registration No. 46-5672427. APRA is approved by Facebook for Charities, eBay for Charity, Paypal Giving Fund, and Guidestar.