Category Archives: fraud

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Fraud in medicine: FAXMANIA!!

All right, the latest trend in the complete insanity that is the United States Medical Corporate Black Hole Eating The American Dream: FAXMANIA!!!!

I am a Veterans Choice rural provider. Well, I thought I was. But turns out even though the VA keeps calling me to accept new veterans who are more than 40 miles from the nearest VA, they have not paid me for one visit in 2015. And I did between 20 and 30.

Because, you see, even though they have me listed as a Veterans Choice Provider, the paper work is SPECIAL and it has to be PERFECT and we have to fax EVERYTHING.

So I have to fax every single clinic note to Veterans Choice. Where, presumably, they lose it and have plausible deniability. Also, when a patient comes to see me, they are only approved for ONE NEW PATIENT VISIT, TWO FOLLOW UP VISITS, WITHIN THE STATED DATES, which is two months. Then I have to fill out a form and send it to Veterans Choice, who sends it to triwest, to get approval to continue to be my patient’s primary care doctor FOR ONE YEAR ONLY. Then I have to remember to do it again. AND I have to fill out a form to send to Veterans Choice, who sends it to triwest, for every single referral or test more complicated (read: expensive) than an xray AND for labwork AND don’t forget to fax a copy of every clinic note to Veterans Choice so they know I did it AND now for one patient’s medicine, I have ALSO fax a copy of every note to his VA PRIMARY CARE DOCTOR so that she will refill his pain medicine because: Hell if I know, apparently it’s EASIER to fill from her than me because the VA has no frigging idea who I am.

And the Veterans Choice 40 mile rule? We have two patients now from Whidby Island. They have to take a ferry to see me. Yes, they can bring a car on the ferry. Yes, they can get here except when the ferry is canceled for very low tides or weather….Yes, it’s insane.

Meanwhile, this note from the State of Washington Health Care Authority, aka medicaid: “The Contractor shall require that when subcontracted provider organizations with certified EHRs see an Apple Health Managed Care enrollee, they send a care summary (CCDA) from the providers EHR to the WA Link4Health Clinical Data Repository beginning no later than February 1, 2017.” Translation? Oh, we have to send bloody proof that we saw the bloody patient in the form of a CCDA electronically OR ELSE! OR ELSE WE ARE BREAKING THE LAW! They wouldn’t want to fire us but you betcha they would love to fine the hell out of us. Note: This requirement only applies to provider organizations who have already invested in certified EHR technology.

Hi, Big Brother.

Now, fax is HIPAA compliant, as long as we include the cover disclaimer that IF WE SENT IT TO THE WRONG PLACE SHRED WITHOUT READING OR YOU WILL BE STRUCK DEAD BY LIGHTENING FROM THE SKY GODS AND/OR THE ORBITING LASER HIPAA POLICE.

And meanwhile I have lab order forms for the three labs in town (all completely different and even with different panels) and one in Sequim, also 6 different forms for 6 different places for xrays, CT scans, MRIs, a form for the Vascular imaging, a form for cardiology, different ones for each physical therapy office. Now the DMV disabled parking form must be accompanied by a prescription on legal Washington State prescription paper saying yeah, he is disabled. Why use one piece of paper when you can require two?

When I fill out lab orders for the local hospital, the patients sometimes say, “Can you fax that over?”

“Yes,” I say, “but they lose 50% of them.” No, really. We fax them and keep a copy and then the patient goes in and the lab calls and says, “We don’t have the order.” I am not sure if they are “lost” or just in a pile to be entered into the TIME SAVING ELECTRONIC MEDICAL RECORD COMPUTER SYSTEM THAT MAKES EVERYTHING FASTER AND MADE US PAPERLESS EXCEPT FOR THE TEN MILLION FAXES DAILY. “You are better off picking it up and handing it to them, or I can mail it to you.” The other day a patient asked if that was malice, since I am not in the hospital system. “No,” I said, “I think they have laid people off until there aren’t enough and the corporation dumps the long timers that know stuff and cost more.”

Once I was working on a holiday Monday. I had a patient who I thought had a new arrythmia. I called the hospital and asked the tech if we could do an outpatient ECG on this holiday.

“I don’t know.” the tech said.

There was a silence. I wondered if the tech would ask someone in authority.

“I’m new.” said the tech. “They’ve laid a lot of people off.”

Someone in authority WAS present. “We can do one on a holiday.” I said firmly. “I will send her right over. Call me when it’s done.” So the tech did it.

Where medicaid goes, medicare follows and then the insurance companies will too. Next, I predict that we will have to fax every note to the appropriate company every single visit, and to the secondary insurance too. And then they will install a video camera in each office and videotape every clinic visit…. and I will either be a physician in another country or be doing something else….

 

What, you say, does the shack have to do with this? I can always go live there, off the grid, if I can’t stand the paperwork and hoops I have to jump through. It is a play house at my family’s land on a lake in Ontario, built in the 1970s. Friends and I put a new roof on this year: their 6 year old was delighted. It would be frightfully cold in the winter and anyhow, I can only stand straight in the middle….

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fraud in medicine: prior authorization I

Prior authorization is where, in the insane United States medical system, the doctor orders a test or medicine. The insurance requires “prior authorization”, that is, the doctor or their office have to call or go on line to fill out forms to get the prior authorization. Otherwise the test or therapy or medicine or even surgery will not be covered by the insurance and the patient eats the bill. Over 60% of bankruptcies in the US are now over medical bills*.

In most doctors’ offices, the prior authorization is done in the back rooms. Employees are on the computer or on the phone trying to obtain the permission, the code number, the magic words that will help the patient. This is a HUGE business and a scam as well. Physicians for a National Health Care Program estimated in 2011 that it costs at least $82,975 PER PHYSICIAN PER YEAR to have a person calling.* Now, there is a person on the other end receiving that call or going over the forms. That person is paid with your insurance premium. Is that health care? It seems more like a barrier to health care. Let’s look at an example.

I do my prior authorizations in the room with the patient. I only have a front desk person, no back room people, and anyhow, if I do it face to face with the patient, I can charge the insurance company for the call. It is face to face counseling and coordination of care. I don’t get paid well for this, but it’s worth it for the patient education.

Yesterday I called for a patient. The insurance company first has a recording that tells me it is recording this conversation. I am too, in the chart note. Then it reminds me I could do all this on line. Well, that is sort of true. I could, but every insurance company has a different website, they all require logins and passwords and it would take me hours to learn them all. Nope, not doing that. After the message it says: “Please enter the physicians NPI number.” I do. Then it leads me through choices: confirm the patient is insured, check the status of a prior authorization, appeal a prior authorization, initiate a prior authorization. That one.
At 3 minutes 50 seconds, I get a human. We are on speaker phone.
“This is Rex. You are calling for prior authorization?”
“Yes. This is Dr. Lizard. Mr. X is in the room.”
“Please spell the doctor’s name.” They are not used to doctors calling.
“Please give the NPI number.” (ok, we typed that in. But every time you are transferred, you have to give all of the information again. I am not kidding.)
“Please give your clinic address. Please give your clinic phone number. Please give your clinic tax ID number. Please give your clinic fax number.”
I do.
“Please give the patient id number. Please give the patient name. Please give the patient date of birth.”
Ok.
My patient is looking amazed. This is how insurance companies treat the doctors who call them? Yep.
“What medicine are you authorizing?”
“A compounded testosterone.”
“Please list the ingredients.”
Crap. didn’t think of that. “Ok, we want to authorize an fda approved one.”
That is entered. “What are the instructions for the patient?”
“What is the dose or strength?”
“What is the diagnosis?”
“He has a condition from birth with no testosterone.”
I have to spell the condition for Rex.
“What is the ICD 10 code?”
I give that.
“Have you measured a testosterone level?”
“Yes. It’s zero. His body doesn’t make testosterone. Since birth.”
My patient is rolling his eyes.
“The form will be sent for review and you should get a fax within 24-72 hours regarding the authorization. Here is a number for tracking.”
“Thank you, we are recording this phone call as face to face counseling and coordination of care in the chart.”
Phone call is 13 minutes and 50 seconds. That is a fast one, actually. Most are 25-30 minutes and I fought for an hour once when a patient’s prescription coverage was cancelled.

I wish that every doctor in the country would do one prior authorization on the phone once a week with the patient in the room. The doctors’ heads would blow off. They might finally see what the current system is doing and how the insurance companies throw more and more and more barriers up to refuse people care.

And how is it a scam? One way is that the patient calls the insurance. The insurance has people who only talk to patients. That person says, “Have your doctors office call for a prior authorization.” The patient calls the doctor’s office. The doctors office calls the insurance, but they are talking to a different branch of the insurance company. That branch tells the doctors office “We don’t cover that.” The doctors office calls the patient, who then thinks that the doctor’s office has screwed up the prior authorization.

How do I know that? With the person in the room, the insurance tells me “No.” I have had patients say, “Your company told me yesterday that all I needed was for the doctor to call!” The insurance person replied, “I only talk to doctors. It is another part of the company that talks to patients.” I have also had an insurance person say “Take me off speaker phone, I am only allowed to talk to physician’s offices, not to patients.” Riiiiiight. I took him off but put him right back on. My patients are outraged and furious: at the insurance, not me. The insurance companies are doing brilliant business plan triangulation and I hope whoever thought it up and whoever allows it as a business plan roasts in hell. No, instead I hope that they wake up and realize how many people they are hurting and I hope that they turn and work to heal a broken sick system.
*http://www.pnhp.org/new_bankruptcy_study/Bankruptcy-2009.pdf
http://www.pnhp.org/sites/default/files/docs/Bankruptcy_Fact_Sheet.pdf
**http://www.pnhp.org/news/2011/august/us-doctors-administrative-costs-4-times-higher-than-in-canada
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2014/august/adventures-in-prior-authorization

I took the photograph at Lake Matinenda in August 2015. It is of a storm. A storm is here in medicine: people versus the corporations who prey on us. We need to heal the system and heal the fear and greed.

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Fraud in medicine: medicare application

Medicare quit paying my clinic at the end of July, on the 31st.

I was still half time in clinic, we were interviewing a new receptionist as my receptionist of five years wanted to retire by August first. We got some sort of notification from medicare, but their letters are very cryptic.

My new receptionist was needing orientation and help and I was really tired after July. I redid the medicare application and sent it in. We continued to see medicare patients and turn in the bills.

Our medicare contractor is noridian. They sent us a cryptic letter saying that something was wrong with the application. This was, mind you, a renewal. I had been seeing medicare patients for five years in my clinic.

I call them. I am given a name and a number to identify the call. I have two Ptan numbers, one for me as a physician and a second for the clinic. The first call said that my personal Ptan application was correct but the clinic one wasn’t.

I did it again and mailed it. Second day air. He said that our payments should be released in 10-14 days.

Ten days. Nothing. Fourteen. Nothing. I am pulling from savings to run the clinic. I call a second time. Again I am given a name and a number. She said I had to CALL to get paid once the application was received. I said the first guy didn’t say that. She said another 10-14 days.

We wait. After ten days I call. A third number and person. Once again I have a cryptic email. I ask about the PTan number on the email, which is not my clinic’s Ptan number. Oh, says the man, that is what is wrong with your application. He says to do form (numbernumbernumber B) not form (numbernumbernumber A). And it will be 10-14 days after they receive it.

I do it AGAIN. I do notice that all of the old copies of the form in our file have the PTan numbers wrong. Weird. They have been paying me for five years.

Ten days. I call a fourth time. She says that it will be 30 days not 10 to 14 until medicare lets me know if my application is correct. Or they might pay me after 10-14 days. They aren’t, so I argue that something must still be wrong. What is it? She can’t tell me. I want a supervisor. She says that I can talk to a supervisor in 10-14 days. We figure out that the Ptan number on the application is correct. I say, “I am writing my congresswoman.” and hang up.

So I do. I find my Senator’s email and I write to her. I have been a rural family practice doctor for 25 years and I saw a 98 year old yesterday and a 91 year old today and I LIKE my elderly patients, but I have HAD it with medicare, at least with the contractor noridian that is running medicare for my state. I list the phone call dates and names and identifying numbers and I say FIX IT because otherwise I am for the first time in 25 years seriously considering quitting medicare.

Two days later noridian sends an email saying they are releasing my payments.

The next day we get a direct deposit for $9000.00. That is a START.

One week later we get a call from noridian explaining what is wrong with our application. Not just one thing. Noridian doesn’t seem to have a copy of our business license from five years ago. We have to put the personal Ptan on page xgyb-14. They want details about the nursing home. Do I do home visits?

The noridian person explains that our application has actually been wrong for five years, but now they are getting audited so they have to get everything cleaned up.

So THEY have KNOWN it was wrong for five years, but held my payments since July, while they try to get their act together and tell me what the hell is wrong with it?

I want to be paid INTEREST for all the time I have spent on the phone and redoing the cryptic application.

And many thanks to my congresswoman, for keeping my clinic open.

I took the picture at the Kinetic Sculpture Festival here in September. The outfits make more sense than dealing with noridian, that’s for sure….

first posted on everything2.com on 11/30/15