Why we don’t take health insurance….

On our new website (www.dedicatedwellness.com) we have a FAQ page. And on this page is a question that asks, “Do we take health insurance”, and the answer to this is of coarse NO. I briefly explain that we are a cash practice and that we will be happy to help anyone with a super bill, which is a self submission way for you to get reimbursed for at least a portion of what your insurance may cover for out of network providers. ANYWAY, my wife and I debated for a bit on whether or not we should go into greater detail about the philosophical reasoning behind why we don’t take insurance, we decided against publishing it on the site and thought we’d save it for the blog in hopes that we could explain clearly our reasons and also get feedback from you.

I will begin with a fact, my clients who have been with me for years almost all have some form of health insurance that offers chiropractic coverage. However, they all choose to come to me for the same reasons, they get what they pay for. My rates are average in the Chiropractic world and my sessions are much longer than most Chiropractors so really they are getting MORE than what they pay for. Clients come to me as a form of preventative health care and a sort of maintenance for their body like you would take your car for check ups or your clothes to the cleaners, they all view their health as their responsibility. They do what they can to enhance their lives and coming to me helps them to facilitate that.

In my opinion there is something that happens to most people when you take away their right to choose, their decision to be accountable for what doctor they choose, how much one decides to spend on themselves, etc.. When you take away responsibility, people lose the desire to be responsible. I feel as though one of the many reasons our health care system is failing many, is because of this philosophy.

It works the same way for the Doctor who is providing the health care also. The current system creates boundaries for the Doctor, they stand between the patient and the Doctor, for example they decide how much the Doctor should charge, what the Doctor should call his procedures and they determine exactly what each procedure should entail, for example; they give a list of options that I have to use, if everything I provide does not fall under these options they refuse to cover it and because I am an alternative Chiropractor, their options are almost never congruent with what I offer, this puts me in a situation where I am forced to either change my procedure or alter my fee system, both of which are unethical and against my values and beliefs. These boundaries and regulations take the responsibilities out of the Physicians hands, essentially take the practice out of the Physicians hands and becomes a third party filtering the quality of care you are entitled to.

This is like the cliff notes of our reasoning, and some day I will write a book, but for now, this is the jist. When you come here, to Dedicated Wellness, You and I will decide how your care will go, You and I will decide the method in which you will heal. You will make the choice to pay and get better and I will make the choice to help you. And through this method we will get very very far.

Their is no way to abuse this system, it works for all parties involved. Everyone here is here because they choose to be.

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