I need your help - abuses in medical practice and insurance.

[JANENE]

Well Mark,

I had my sx in November 2004, after a work-related injury, at that point I was doing well returned back to work in April 2005. In July 2005, while at work I had what the WC calls a "recurrance" I was lifting a pile of charts and BAM!!! Down to the floor I went in pain.

WC re-opened my claim, I had PT, ESI shots (the last one causing a 1-week stay in hospital, 2 blood patches, because a Resident by mistake caused a CSF leak.) etc...etc... then finally WC decided that they were going to send me for pain management in a 4-week in-stay program, away from my husband and children. If I didn not participate in this program then they would stop my payments and I would have to return back to work right away. I gave it the benefit of the doubt and went to the Orientation & Assessment for the PMP.

In April of last year my husband left me and my kids, explaining that this was all too much for him to handle and that he can't take seeing me so miserable and depressed and upset all the time. It was then that I called my Adujicator to explain to him my present situation and ask him if there was anyway that they could offer me transportation to and from the PMP daily, as I am not able to drive 50 mins there and back everyday for 4-weeks, but will not be able to stay over because I have no definate care for my 4 small children.

I never heard anything back from him. Then 2-weeks before the date of my start, I called him again and left a message as to what was going on, and he called me back explaining that because I am not participating in the programs that WSIB has offered, I am no longer going to be receiving LOE benefits. I have been cut off since June 2006.

I had my NEL (Non-Economic Loss) assessment. And was awarded a certain percentage of disability..etc..etc..etc..

So they sent me as well as my doctor outlining WHY I was being cut off of my benefits, and told that I should be back at work, there is NO reason for me to be off of work.

So, when I went to my doctor (GP) who might I add has NOT given me the okay to return to work, he told me to find a lawyer and aloow them to appeal the decision. Okay, so I did that.

It has still been 8 mths, NO MONEY, I had to go on to Social Assistance, to help me pay my bills, disability told me I had to sell my car if I wanted to get disability benefits. Which I explained to them as well as my lawyer. So the years before my WORK-RELATED accident that I worked my butt off paying for my bills, providing for my family and for myself, etc..etc.. I am just suppose to throw all those years of hard work away???

I am still fighting with WSIB (Cananda), now Social Assistance has told me that because of the amount of "support" I should be getting from my ex-husband, they can no longer give me the financial help I require, because my "gross" amount is over what thier "quota" or whatever is.. Too bad my ex isn't able to pay me what he needs to because he has to live too.

So it is getting from BAD to WORSE.......and I still have my GP telling me there is NO WAY I am able to return to work......So where do I go now?

I hope this wasn't too long.........

Janene

[dshobbies]

Wow Mark, I just wrote a thoughtful and elequant response to your request but hit a wrong button and it vanished, forever!!!!!

Abuses to our system include J&J’s greed in charging the U.S. outrageous prices for the Charite, causing in part, the ins industry’s denial of adr coverage. Doctors, ill equipped due to personal inexperience, performing procedures which result in negative outcomes necessitating supplementary medical care further skews sightable statistics. Though one is needed for the patient community, would an outcome database demonstrating ‘bad surgeons’ result in their personal patient profiles being completely discounted by risk management statisticians?

Doctors are not required to inform their patients about alternative procedures that have not yet been approved by the FDA regardless of their position in current trials and any possible benefit to their patient. Some doctors will purposely misinform patients about procedures they personally don’t perform. Does this apply to informed consent? Is it even provable? Is this matter of he said/she said even enforceable?

Though all of the above is applicable not only to the spinal community but to our entire medical society, it is nonetheless pertinent to abuses, causation against reimbursement and negatively impacts new technology, all of which are relevant to marketing, reimbursement and regulation.

Since I hail from Brooklyn, keep me informed about a spiney gathering.

Dale

[annapurna]

For those of us with regional HMO's, insurance reimbursement of ADR and other motion-preserving spine procedures are limited not only by general insurance company policies, but also by local availability of skilled surgeons.

If I want insurance reimbursement for any medical procedure, I can only go to providers in my local area, which includes northern Utah. So, if there are no ADR surgeons in the greater Salt Lake City area, I'm paying in cash regardless of what the FDA or any other policy-makers say.

As employers get pushed harder and harder by increasing medical insurance costs, they tend to shift from "open" plans like PPO's to HMO's, which are regionally-restrictive. I'm lucky in that I have a high enough income that I can pay cash when necessary, but I've still needed to sacrifice to get my L5/S1 Charite and c5/c6 Prodisc. My husband and I rent an economical apartment and own one, aged Toyota between the two of us. We have no children. All the money that our friends spend on vacations, toys, homes, cars, and kids gets poured into my spine.

It's a bit scary to consider that the progress of medical technology may be limited in the future not because the advances are not needed, but because no one is able or willing to pay for them. I'm grateful that I've been blessed with the ability to make that choice for myself and wish that it was possible for everyone to do so.

[Poncho]

This is the main reason why I am getting my MBA and hopefully attempt to figure out these approval / denial process further regarding HMO's vs PPO's et al and what recourse action patients. I believe in choices and HMO's tend to restrict this. Managed care was suppose to "control" health care costs - but it really hasn't. They have only been inflationary.

[annapurna]

Bless you Poncho! With people like you getting involved in the healthcare reimbursement system, there is hope for all of us.