After "thinking about it" for almost 12 years (my whole time in practice), I've finally decided to stop playing the insurance game. Yep, we're turning into one of those offices that "doesn't take insurance." We'll continue to file it for people, and most people with PPO coverage will (probably) get something back. It's just gotten to be way too stressful. So stressful, in fact, that it me made think (a lot) about throwing in the towel all together and just leaving practice. Then I thought, "Wait a minute... who ARE these people - insurance - and how have we gotten to this place where doctors and patients are at the mercy of INSURANCE COMPANIES?" Insurance companies are these giant faceless profit-driven fear monsters that have somehow come to represent legitimate voices in health care. The process has been so insidious that most people aren't aware of how insane and out-of-control it's become. People assume that everyone "should have insurance" and that "insurance pays for health care." It doesn't really work that way - at all. Don't get me wrong -- I fully believe that everyone should have access to the health care that they need and that getting sick shouldn't bankrupt anyone! But this insurance industry? Disaster. Just a few years after graduating from chiropractic school, I actually had the chance to work for an insurance company -- as one of those doctors who is employed to help reject claims from their fellow professionals. I would have been pretty good at it, too, since I was still very book-smart from school and have a sharp eye for spotting errors on paper. But that's not why I got into this profession. I'm here to help people get well, NOT to contribute to this paperwork hell that's infected American health care. Patients don't hear too much about it from the doctor side, but even they are starting to come to the frightening realization that doctors largely prescribe care based on what the insurance companies will pay for. Sometimes, they do it with the best of intentions. Even I, knowing that these are tough times, would often try to get someone well within the parameters of what their insurance would "cover." Just like anyone, I started to think of insurance as "the norm." It wasn't until some serious soul searching that I concluded that it makes NO SENSE. Some recent bully tactics of the insurance companies have brought it to a head. I'm not going to waste my time playing a paperwork battle against these faceless entities to justify whether or not a patient needed an adjustment or to "prove" that the adjustment was "medically necessary." Nobody is duped or forced to come to this office. Nobody here gets an adjustment who doesn't need one. Yeah, I know that the paperwork game is supposed to "reduce fraud" and all that. But guess what? The crooks are GREAT at falsifying paperwork. Criminals are very often one step ahead of the law. Some recent sad cases of children dying in the social services realm highlight this point : the kids were abused and not checked on, yet the paperwork was totally in order and indicated that visits HAD happened. What does all this have to do with chiropractic? Well, I don't know about the rest of the profession - or the rest of the health care industry - but as one single practitioner, I've had enough. Someday, maybe in my lifetime, maybe not, this whole system will topple and be exposed for the failure that it is. But I can't wait around for that day. Systems like this gain their incredible power because individuals overwhelmingly did nothing and let them take the power. Doctors should be accountable to their patients and their communities, and maybe to a jury of their peers, but NOT to giant corporations.
Anyway, having "good insurance" is no assurance that you'll be healthy! It just means that you'll get to visit a bunch more doctors for less cash than the uninsured person next to you. Ultimately, being healthy is about taking care of yourself and valuing your own health. Oddly enough, the healthiest patients in the office tend to be the ones with little-to-no insurance coverage. My guess is that having been forced to be largely responsible for their own health, they take it upon themselves to stay healthy! Gee, what a concept.
Sorry for the "down" toned blog entry first thing in the year. It can't be sunny all the time!
-DK