While Medicare Part A (hospital insurance) is generally premium-free, the 2026 inpatient hospital deductible is only $1,736 per stay (up from$1,676 in 2025) — and that’s just one example of unexpected out-of-pocket costs (3). To put this in perspective, the average cost of a one-day hospital stay was $3,297 in 2024, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation (4). Even worse, based on the latest CDC data (5), the full average adjusted cost was$14,101 per inpatient stay at community hospitals, which refers t ...