When 22-year-old Briana Lane was seriously injured in a car accident this past January, doctors at the University of Utah Health Sciences Center scrambled to save her life. The process included removing half her skull. Briana should have got that half-skull put back within a month, but instead the hospital hung on to it. They were waiting to see who was going to pay them for their work.

With a big "screw you" to the Hippocratic Oath, the hospital cancelled the replacement surgery while waiting on word from Medicaid as to whether or not it was covered. With no insurance of her own, Lane was left to wear a hockey helmet and endure constant pain, blackouts and waking to find her brain shifted to one side.

After almost four months, Lane took the story to her local TV station. Her mother's insurance company then offered to foot the bill, and the hospital suddenly became keen on giving the girl her skull back.

» Scott Saxon