YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE ..
PAY ME NOW!!!
...sigh..
Mainly.. they wanted your insurance card or medicare card.. the rest could wait .. maybe.. Doc was a country boy.. he had a medical degree.. he was born and educated as close to home as possible.. and then he came back home to take care of his town. He was a cold, stomach ache, 3 stitches in a finger or a forehead, and head lice doctor you know.. if you had something serious enough that you went to see him twice, and had to go back the third time.. he made you an appointment with a specialist and did not try to treat you any longer. He never admitted anyone to the hospital.. if he felt they needed to go .. he got them a specialist for their particular ailment.. and they got well. Well by golly when that man finally gave it up.. the entire world of medicine seemed to give up its last gasp for our little town.. we started having a series of doctors fresh from med school who had been given money for education in return for basically indenturing themselves to these big clinics for up to 5 years or more. They had to come to the small towns and work off their loans in the clinics.. no matter if they spoke English well enough to make us understand that they just wanted us to to go away basically!...
..sigh..
Every time I went to the doctor or took someone .. there was a new doctor and a new receptionist and nurse to greet and meet each time for several years.. Then the big clinic doctors got tired of the same things their long time patients got tired of quick.. the big clinics wanted them to treat the people for everything from mental illness to preventive checkups.... and they were in no way in any kind of control of how much to charge the people who had been their patients for basically all their lives. And what was so bad.. is that they would come down to the clinics and chew the doctors out right in front of the patients in a full waiting room! Believe it.. I have seen it with my own eyes.. this one lady had several patients who needed their blood sugar levels checked at least twice a week.. but the old darlin's didn't have the money for the supplies.. so she would have them walk to the clinic a couple times a week and she would check their sugar for them for a couple of dollars.. OH NO, They fired that lady.. and I and many other people had to bear witness to them doing it.. it was shameful!...
..sigh...
That act broke the clinic up badly. Most of their really good long term doctors left our area.. they went all over the USA.. the only one left to me is my gyn doctor.. in private practice.. but he still must deal with the big clinic to get testing and hospital space and operating rooms.. He really had to swallow a big mouthful of HMO pootea to remain with his patients whom he really cared about
....sigh...
Then after the doctors left and they decided the indentured servant doctors were not what could operate in our small communities.. we then received the Nurse Practitioners.. who for all intents and purposes are really pretty tuned in and educated to taking care of sore throats, scraped knees, head lice, and the odd stitch.. but that is not what these clinics want from them. They are in contact with a doctor at the main clinic for each patient they see. It is entered into the computer.. and before the patient leaves the office.. they concur with the NP on their treatment. They can't write a prescription themselves.. but the consulting doctor when he concurs has given the go ahead to call it into a pharmacy using his license number. This would work great if the clinics would not press them to treat EVERYTHING
...sigh...
If you go in with pink eye.. before you leave they have set you up for a pap smear, a mammogram, and a cholesterol screening.. and usually you get something for the pink eye in there somewhere.. but sad to say.. sometimes they forget in the push to get all your WELL CARE ... which in my opinion.. is something we could all do without.. Go to the doctor when your sick.. Go to the dentist when your tooth hurts..I do my own breast self exams.. I do not need to have my breast mashed and imaged, so that they can scare the bejezzits out of me with a potential problem that turns out to be a shadow on their film.. No thank you! No cholesterol screenings.. no jacking with my blood pressure with all these medicines to get it just right.. for my statistical size.. I am not a statistic.. I am me.. and waiting in a waiting room for 3 hours will have a tendency to make any ones blood pressure shoot up a bit..
sigh..
I don't believe in root canals.. pull it out if it offends you.. hell with all that drilling and cleaning and well basically bull frocky.. when your gona be in dentures when you get old.. everyone is.. no matter if you had a root canal that took 3 appointments to get done and 1500 dollars worth of the dentists education and tools.. not to mention all those 15 women they have working for them salaries to pay... . whom most of the time when I sit and wait to go in.. mostly talk to their kids on the phone doing their homework over the phone
...sigh....
I do not understand the need to know how much money I make a year and where I work if I pay in cash either.. the questionnaires are just too much like making a purchase at Radio Shack.. only place I know of that won't make the sale without a phone number from you..
sigh..
What brings this subject to rear its ugly pimply head at this particular time in my life.. is when I had the flu last year .. on Feb. 1, 2008.. I went to the clinic.. every wall in that place had a huge sign.. with the words..
YOU ARE EXPECTED TO MAKE PAYMENT IN FULL FOR ANY TREATMENT YOU RECEIVE BEFORE YOU LEAVE TODAY.. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR BILL.. NOT YOUR INSURANCE COMPANY.. FILING YOUR INSURANCE or MEDICARE CLAIM FOR YOU IS A COURTESY TO YOU FROM US.
(bite me)
This of course makes most people feel even worse than they already do.. the fear starts to settle in on you in the waiting room.. What does it cost to get your boob smashed and your temperature taken these days? And then how much is the pill peddler over across the street gona hit me for.. ( I have never gotten out of a pharmacy for less than a hundred dollars spent in years) Then you have the walk in clinics which make you pay them before you even see the doctor.. then after you go back and get told you need your boobs smashed.. your blood drained and for some reason they are manic about my urine.. (strange profession) they give you a sheet of paper with all these numbers on it with little boxes next to them they have checked off for the Q-tips and tongue depressor they used on you.. and you pay that with another check before you can leave.. I have always wanted to bolt out the door screaming..
"STAY LOW TO THE GROUND KID.. DOC AND WYATT ARE MEETING US OUT BACK WITH THE HORSES! YOU STILL GOT YOUR CHECK LIST? WE WILL NEED IT LATER TO USE FOR CHARMIN .. IT IS BIG ENOUGH FOR ALL FOUR OF US .. AND SOME LEFT OVER!"
... but I am a wuss.. and besides that I can't afford an attorney either..just to see what would happen.. and they usually keep your drivers license till they get that final check from you.. the cowards.. smart cowards.. but cowards nevertheless...
sigh..
Anyway.. the NP decided I was a good candidate for this sugar pill they call Tamiflu.. which is supposed to be a miracle flu killer if they give it to you within the first 48 hours.. I had plainly told the lady I had been sick for a week.. I had 103 temperature.. but that is what I got.. 100 dollars worth of nothing that was not going to work.. I drove home.. three days later I was back.. and I was not feeling as easy calm on the verge of death as earlier.. I wanted an antibiotic and I wanted something for the symptoms or I was just going to stay with them till I got well.
I told her that..
she looked at me kind of like..
"Gee. she must of figured out I am not a demigod"
.. and called in a prescription for the medicine I requested. Chephalexon.. the wonder drug of the 21st century! Both times I was given a statement.. which I paid by check in full before I left.. I thought it a little bit cheap.. at Fifty six dollars and eighty cents.. but I felt to bad to ask. Now mind you this was in Feb. of this year.. In June I got a statement for fourteen dollars and twenty cents.. to pay the office calls in full. sigh... I threw it in the trash. I threw the one in July in the trash.. and August.. and then September. Finally in October I broke down and pulled up a new file in Word and wrote them a polite note asking them to remove the mistaken balance from my account. I had paid in full .. I sent this letter to them in October.. and I sent a copy of that same letter in November... and here it is December.. and I decided to write a new letter to them.. being more specific and plain spoken to them about THEIR MISTAKE.. because this statement had tacked to the bottom of it.. another note which I love how they put things to you ..
THIS IS AN ATTEMPT TO COLLECT AND SETTLE A DEBT OWED BY YOU. ALL CORRESPONDENCE WILL BE USED ALSO IF IT CAN HELP US TO COME TO A SATISFACTORY END TO THIS DEBT.
sigh...
So I probably gave them some ammunition to use to try to collect this debt they say I owe.. which I say they can kiss my ass because they had a rate hike in June and want me to pay that rate instead of the one in Feb. They can kiss both cheeks of my ass.. and I hope they get chapped lips and no one will sell them any vaseline.. which there will be none left on the shelf if everyone pays them this money ... they will all be receiving a large jar of it with the next attempt to collect a debt notice they get..
sigh..
I told them that they should adhere to their own guidelines that are plastered all over the clinics walls if they want us to. And I believed I was right in the matter and if they had the balls to turn this twenty eight dollars and forty cents over to a collection agency and have it on my credit report.. that my attorney would be contacting them and he would make sure .. I got paid in full before they left the courthouse.. I also added that this was an attempt to correct a mistake on the clinics billing policies and my account.. that any and all information I had and in the future they might provide me.. would be used to that end..
sigh...
I ain't letting em smash my boobs either.. nope..
lockerridge 