Collections agencies need to provide you with an itemized list of what you owe and to who.
If a hospital gives out this information, especially if they didn’t even try to collect it themselves, they have violated HIPPA.
Will a collections agency give you a document proving they vioated HIPPA? No. Do you owe debts on something w/o receipts? No.
Think, not a lawyer, it’s not effectively true. Collection doesn’t need medical records, they just need a number to go after. Hell collections don’t even need to prove you have the debt they are going after, they can still go after you. Lots of stories of people paying off debt and still getting calls about it
When you get a bill in the mail from a collections agency you can request that the agency validate the debt, and they will have to formally provide the following information before you are required to repay the debt:
[collection agency’s] name and mailing address
the name of the creditor you owe it to
how much money you owe, written out to include interest, fees, payments, and credits
what to do if you don’t think it’s your debt
your debt collection rights, including your right to get information about the original creditor if you ask for it within 30 days of getting validation information from the collector