Walk into the emergency room as a randomly unlucky American. Your diagnosis is drawn with real-world odds for your age and sex, and the bill you receive is an actual (anonymized) 2023 ER visit record from the federal MEPS survey.
How it works. Conditions are drawn in proportion to their survey-weighted share of 2023 U.S. ER visits for your age band and sex; each bill is a real charge/payment pair from one sampled MEPS visit (HC-248E). Rare conditions (under 6 sampled visits per demographic cell) are excluded. For entertainment and education — see the full analysis for the serious version. Data: AHRQ, Medical Expenditure Panel Survey 2023.