Category Archives: death is part of life

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Dear Mr. Donald Trump

Two weeks ago I sent this letter to Mr. Trump and all of the presidential candidates. To date I have gotten a form letter from Mrs. Hilary Clinton.

Dear Mr. Donald Trump and all Presidential candidates:

Mr. Trump, I am a rural family practice physician, a woman, who owns and runs my own medical clinic. I take care of patients from age zero to 104. Currently my oldest is 98. I take medicare and most insurances, but not medicaid.

I am running into legal immorality across the board from health insurance corporations that are maximizing profits at the expense of my health care dollar, our taxes and my patients. I would like your advice.

For example, the Veterans Hospital contacted me in May of 2015 and asked me to accept Veterans Choice patients, veterans who live more than 40 miles from the nearest VA Hospital. I accepted. I have 6 veteran patients, who are very complicated. To date I have not been paid for one visit. Now, before you say this is the fault of our government, it isn’t. It is the private for profit government contractor Triwest who is not paying me. They have my notes and we have followed their instructions on how to submit bills. Would you advise me to drop these patients?

For example, my father died in 2014. I called the oxygen company to pick up 6 tanks of oxygen. Then I found 8 more. I gently inquired why he had 14 tanks. The company said that his medical orders said that he should wear it continuously, so they delivered it. “Medicare paid for it.” they said. Ah. Well, I kept the other 8 tanks, because it is my and my father’s oxygen in those tanks: the company can have the tanks back when they are empty.

For example, the head of the sleep apnea supply company came to see me. He said, “You are getting in the way of your patients getting needed equipment.” I said, “Really? How?” “You only allowed a refill of one of the 8 necessary pieces of CPAP tubing instead of signing off on the whole group so we can fill as needed.” “Ah.” I said, “Actually my patients are tired of you mailing them 8 pieces of plastic that are filling up their closets and they don’t want extra plastic crap.” He mails it at the interval allowed by medicare, never mind whether the patient wants or needs it.

For example, I called a patient’s insurance to get a prior authorization last week for a limited sinus CT. They no longer do prior authorizations. They will decide whether to cover the CT scan once they read my notes. I asked if there was ANY way to see if it would be approved. They offered to let me send a letter to a PO Box in Wisconsin. My patient was sick, Mr. Trump. What do you suggest the patient and I do?

This is all legal. But it is not moral. So, Mr. Trump, where do you stand? Is our country’s highest value free enterprise and profit at any cost, no matter how many of our seniors are legally ripped off? Or do we have morals that health care and our elderly are important and need to be protected from legal but predatory businesses.

Please let me know, Mr. Trump. I would rather stick with my small clinic in the United States. At this point I would be financially and emotionally better off working as a temporary doctor internationally. I am sure that there is immorality internationally, but I will be less ashamed when it is not MY country.

Thank you.

 

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Costume 8

This is the last in this costume series and now it’s revealed. My sister was not wearing a costume but she contributed to the festivities by showing off her ballet skills. Her daughter was more interested in dinner than ballet at that particular moment, even though they performed together. My sister loved to dance and loved the costumes there too.

Taken in 2009, Lake Matinenda, Ontario, Canada. My sister died of breast cancer in 2012.

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Costume

My sister loved to dress up in costume. She died four years ago next Tuesday and her birth day is tomorrow.

The photograph is me and her daughter, in costume, at Lake Matinenda in Ontario, Canada, in 2009. I brought a rather demented flower fairy costume. The gloves are my mother’s: crocheted, uncomfortable, romantic and impractical. The whole outfit was entirely silly and impractical for the woods. My sister would bring long ball gowns up to the woods. We played dress up at my grandmothers with our cousins, in my mother’s 1950s prom dresses, in the middle 1970s. We thought her dresses were ridiculous. So were ours, of course.

I am not sure exactly what my niece is dressed as: a boy, I think, and maybe she was being a rapper.

At any rate, it is fun to dress in costume…. miss you, sisty.

 

 

 

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Dream: loving and loved

I read this article yesterday: The rise of American authoritarianism.

I ask for a dream about loving and being loved before going to sleep.

I dream of a prison. I am there as a consultant. There is a woman there, younger than me and beautiful, and the men want to know how to get her out of the prison. It has thick walls and iron bars and security exits and alarms. It is clean, modern, bare, and smells worse than a hospital. But it is the men who run the prison and work in it who want to know how to get her out. How to rehabilitate her. She does not listen to or obey their instructions.

They will not let me talk to the woman or go in the cell with her. They hand me a tablet, where I can see her live. As soon as I have the tablet, I know that she is not trapped in the prison. I turn the tablet around slowly, so the image is upside down. Light appears in the center of the tablet. She can leave any time she wants and she frequently is gone. She walks into the light. The connection is with her all the time. I am so glad that she can walk into the light.

I do not tell the men. They built the prison. They are in the prison, though they think that they are keeping her there. The prison is built of what they think should happen, their authority, their rules.

I am sorry for the men, but they would not believe me even if I told them. I have tried many times.

They don’t see that they are the ones who are in prison.

I give the tablet back.

I wake up.

I took the picture in the sunrise mist in 2006, Lake Matinenda, Ontario, Canada.

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DIY cat fud II

This is for Photrablogger’s Mundane Monday #50.

I crack the door in the early am and this is Boa Cat’s first spring mouse. She has a particular muffled call to tell me when she has a mouse. I love this picture because of the shadows and it’s not quite straight on and the light and silhouettes… This mouse was no longer cooperatively playful….

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Fraud in medicine: prior authorization III

I see a patient who has had prolonged sinus symptoms AND her right upper molar has been irritated for weeks, but then Saturday it started hurting. She saw her dentist. The dentist did x-rays and said it’s her sinus. “But my tooth hurts too.”

On exam, her gum is bright red above the tooth, but not swollen as it can be with an abscess. No fever. No bright red spot over the maxillary sinus.

I call our independent radiology service and ask for a limited sinus CAT scan. She is off on Mondays only, it is Monday, she is out of town next Monday. Can they do it today? Yes, but she needs a prior authorization.

I call her insurance, after looking up the CPT code for sinus CT on google. As usual I have to enter numbers before I talk to a human:
patient insurance id number
my tax id number
my national provider index number
and others until I get a human.
Then I have to give the numbers AGAIN because the insurance company deliberately makes it inefficient, even though I have entered them into the phone it doesn’t transfer to the representative and you know that it COULD.
I give my name
patient’s name
patient’s date of birth
clinic address
clinic phone
clinic fax number
tax id
national provider index number
and finally explain: we need a prior authorization for a limited sinus CT and she has five ICD 10 symptom codes.
“She doesn’t need a prior authorization.” says the rep.
“What?” I say, “So it’s covered.”
“We don’t guarantee coverage, but we don’t give prior authorization.”
“What do you mean, you don’t guarantee coverage. I am calling to check.”
“We review the chart afterwards and THEN decide if it’s covered.”
“No. That isn’t good enough. I want to speak to someone who will check the codes and tell us if it will be covered.”
“I will have to transfer you to the (patient something).”
“Fine. Transfer our information please too.”
We go on hold. Time passes.
We are back to a recording:

TALKING TO A REPRESENTATIVE DOES NOT GUARANTEE COVERAGE OF A TEST. PRESS ONE IF YOU ACCEPT THIS.

No two. No other options are offered. I press one.
I talk to the new representative. “I have five diagnosis codes and want to know if the sinus CT will be covered. She is off and they can do it today. She is only off on Mondays.”
“We don’t do prior authorizations.”
“Isn’t there ANY WAY we can find out?”
“You can mail a letter to a PO box and we will review it and let you know.”
I am ….. hard to describe…. my head hurts.
“Would you like the PO box address?”
“How long does that take? Yes we want it. Don’t they have a fax?”
We get the fax number too. I hang up and look helplessly at my patient. “I think it will be covered. I would recommend we do it.”
“Ok.” She says. Her face and tooth hurt.

I call the independent radiology center and set it up for 2 pm.

They call back in the afternoon. She has a sinus infection and the tooth is bad too, they don’t quite look connected. I call the Ear Nose and Throat specialist who wants her on three weeks of augmentin if she tolerates it and then to see her. I thank him and get it rolling.

But….. ok, so the insurance companies contract with me and the patient say that they can change the benefits any time they want. They “notify” me with postcards with online links. Like I have time to read and remember the changes for …. 50 different plans? There are over 500 in the US.

When are we going to stop letting insurance companies take our money and refuse care and refuse to pay the physician and the radiologist? Medicare for all, one set of rules, I COULD LEARN THEM. I can memorize huge amounts of data: I am already busily memorizing the ICD10 diagnosis codes. There are only 48,000.

And I don’t know yet if her insurance will pay for the sinus CT…..

The picture is from Lake Matinenda in Ontario: no computers at our cabin, no outlets, phones mostly don’t work…. heaven.

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Fraud in medicine: prior authorization II

The insurance corporations and the culture of business fraud is destroying the United States economy and allopathic medicine.

I am a US physician who calls for prior authorizations myself, with the patient in the room, and bills the insurance company for the time “counseling and coordination of care” by the minute.

I called with patient X, to get authorization for a medicine, last week. We had already tried by me filling out on line forms, twice, and faxing paperwork to the insurance company. Now I was calling them. His insurance card has a separate number for “Rx”, that is, prescriptions. I call the number.

Call 1 takes me through a phone tree, puts me on hold and then hangs up on me.
Call 2 takes me through the same phone tree: enter my national provider identification number, my tax id number, the patient id number, etc. I reach a human. She asks for my number in case we are cut off. I give it to her. I also confirm my clinic address, national provider number, tax id, fax number, patient id number, date of birth, patient name. She will call back if we are cut off. We are cut off. No call back.
Call 3 takes me through the same phone tree. It hangs up on me before we reach a human.
Call 4 takes me…….we reach a human. He takes my number. He promises to call back if we are cut off. Repeat previous information. We are cut off.

No. Call. Back.

Ok. I call the insurance company main number and explain. Meanwhile I am documenting each call in my patient’s chart. The insurance company explains that the patient is in a Union and the Union has it’s own prescription program which has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE INSURANCE COMPANY. I insist that as the patient’s insurance company, they must help. They give me the number of the Union headquarters and put me on hold to transfer me. We wait five minutes. Then we hang up.

I call the Union. I reach a person. I explain that my patient needs prior authorization and we can’t reach the Rx company and we called the insurance company. The Union person kicks it upstairs and swears someone will call me. Tomorrow.

I apologize to my patient for the continued delay. I document in the chart: billing by time one hour face to face counseling and coordination of care making SIX PHONE CALLS TO TRY TO GET PRIOR AUTHORIZATION AND UNABLE TO. I express frustration in my note. I hope the company reviews the clinic note regarding the high bill, because I would be very happy to think that the insurance company might get upset at the Rx company for costing them money.

This is fraud. This costs United States citizens $82,000.00 per provider per year to have people sitting on the phone, on the computer, trying to get prior authorization approval from the insurance companies. The contract that I sign with an insurance corporation to be a “preferred provider” basically says that the insurance company can change their policy whenever they want. There are 500 plus insurance policies. Do you think you could keep up with every policy’s changing rules? I can’t. Nor can my patients. It is in the interest of the insurance corporation to make it difficult and incomprehensible.

I am told that Donald Trump knows how to run a business. I think he does, by US corporate standards, which means that the business is dishonest. I am not in the land of the free and the brave and the independent. I am in the land of corporate dishonesty and lies and I am angry.

I like my patients and I like medicine. But I hate United States business practice: rob from the poor and the sick to enrich the rich.