final note on subject of medicine- No say in course of treatemnt either- ex. 63y.o was injured @ work some 15 yrs ago, is permanently disbled can hardly walk, the other md's he had seen did nothing other than prescribe pain meds, they could've have told him to apply for disability helped him even but nope- I told him I would not prescribe pain meds but I would find out what was wrong if possible- he has medicaid, did not know he could have gotten disability/medicare, so I ordered a CT of his LS spine, medicaid said NO do an XRAY, which will only show if fractured, did the Xray showed nothing, then was able to order CT, patient had multiple herniated discs with multiple nerve root compressions and prolly has had it since his injury which is why he was unable to walk, could not afford a lawyer and was not well educated beyond HS, also has heart disease and diabetes, fixed the diabetes then he backslided his heart recently got worse went into CHF and is going to be cath/stressed this week, is now getting a small disability check, he's missed the last 13yrs of payments cause he did not apply
usually takes 2 yrs after application and 2 denials before they let you have it- and yes he's white as are 98% of my patient population, his medicare is going to start as well because of his multiple problems- my office fee's is $62.00/visit if he had medicare but he has medicaid which pays $35.00!!! is that fair for his list of problems?
he is but 1 case of what i see every fricken day all day- the system is crap |
