Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimking
I'd also like to see research on the kinds of treatment patients receive relative to the kind of health insurance they have. I'll wager it is an issue. For example those on Workman's comp---HMOs etc. Treatments between insurance companies like BCBS, UnitedHealthcare etc. I believe doctors react to patients depending on the insurance. Example---patient with HMO, doctor says you are a nut----same patient picks up BCBS PPO--doctors says you have RSD and I will help you control this beast-----I've personally seen this happen a few times.
It's one thing that the insurance does not pay for a particular service, but quite another being dismissed as a nut case, which tells me the doc just does not want to deal with it appropriately.
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This was a problem for me, so I've seen it. I had no insurance and I was dismissed. Then I had medicaid (a particularly crappy kind too) and I was called a nut, dismissed and just let slide. But, even while on medicaid I found the doctor who is my PCP now. He started me on the path that led to a diagnosis. He wasn't concerned about the limits of my insurance, or what it was, but how to best work within those confines or how to stretch them for me. Now I have an HRA PPO and I'm sure I'll hit my out of pocket max for the year so between all my docs we just started throwing as much crap at the wall as we could to see what stuck.
I think it's a double edged sword. Some doctors automatically will treat patients differently based on the insurance they have. And often patients are limited in the quality of doctors they see by their insurance. For me that was the biggest factor for a long time.