Louisiana: Insurance Companies Short Change Disabled

By Daniel Taverne

How RIDICULOUS is this?

This past year, insurance companies decided that they would only pay for 20 visits at physical therapy clinics and made this policy retroactive so that physical therapy companies had to actually pay back tens of thousands to insurance companies.

Having to pay back the insurance companies is not the worst of it though. Our kids need way more than 20 sessions per year! These are not the dark ages! Aren’t we, insurance companies included, obligated to provide a maximum quality of life for our special needs children and adults?

Does it take a rocket science degree to see that as a result of these cut-backs, insurance companies will cause themselves to have to pay out even more for resulting situations that occur because of problems regular therapy were preventing?

It’s because of therapy given that one of our clients walked unassisted today. Without the needed therapy sessions, she would not be moving toward maximum independence which, in turn, means she’ll need less and less assistance from others, granting her a better quality of life.

Shame on those insurance companies for not caring about the most dependent in our society. Maybe if one of their family members had a stroke, or was involved in a car accident and needed therapy, they would want more than 20 sessions per year. And, maybe if one of their children was born with cerebral palsy, or had to have their cerebellum removed due to a tumor, they would want more than 20 sessions per year! What do you think?

This is an issue that needs to be addressed. Rehabilitation clinics should not have to take it on the chin just so insurance companies can increase their profit margins. After all, cutting payouts hurts not only the clinic administration, it hurts our adult and children whose therapy will prevent things that will cost way more to treat later on.

We’ve got a client right now, a young lady, who really needs her sessions to maintain flexibility, strength, circulation, and even her psychosocial and psychological health. By cutting her sessions by more than half, she is looking at a much poorer quality of life consisting of increased pain and sickness, and possibly depression.

This is just one example out of dozens that I know will lose out.

So, what can you do? Write, call, or e-mail your congressmen/senators/insurance commissioners and ask them to find a way to subsidize physical/Occupational Therapies as well as speech language pathology. Additionally, write, call or e-mail the major insurers in your state voicing your opinion regarding this matter.