"What is wrong with doctors?"
 

This thread, from the General Health Conditions forum, is far too important a topic and series of posts to just be accessible there, so I'm linking it here:

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread206493.html

Please read, comment, share.

Thanks for the link. I will read it tonight. Take care and thanks again.

Lack of interest and education
 

I the rsd case, many still ignore many things or never heard about it education is the key ,we can help by printing enough researches and information and carry with us and give a copy to the dr we see and educate them as well, if they don't seems interest ,get a new dr until one care and help with at lest reading about rsd, education is the key, we can make the difference ,all together we for sure will make many ignorances will learn something beneficial , they did go school but the school never takes away the emphatic attitude ,so keep lecture them, is my best idea. Ignorance is,ruling our world,changes can start with us teaching each other's , it works !!:grouphug: gentle hugs and caring love from Jesika .

I think this is very true and not very many of us take into consideration everything that a doctor has to know about. Your doctor is not just YOUR doctor, he has many patients with different issues that he has to figure out. It is frustrating when they don't know what is wrong with you. Trust me, right now I am in the same boat. I just swore off my doctors about my wrist and decided I am going to do whatever I want to do about my injury. LOL Some doctors are not very good, like she said, and we have to figure that out and move on to find the ones who will fight for us and figure things out with us. But sometimes we need to give our doctors a break. My family doctor is wonderful and at times I feel bad for him that he has to deal with me! LOL

This is kind of off the subject in a way. We received a bill from a collection agency from my wife's former pain specialist. She has not been to that doctor in 3 years and now we are getting a bill, for what ever reason, from several years ago. This doctor was paid by BCBS, then my credit card and was eventually dumped by this doctor when my wife Suzy became eligible for medicare (doctor refused medicare) in which I continued paying for with my credit card, until the doc said that she wanted nothing to do with medicare even though I was paying for treatment, not medicare (except for the meds). Why this has gotten in the hands of a collection agency without my knowledge is beyond me. How does one prove one way or the other what is owed after years have gone by? I was square with this doc and every other doctor.

Sounds like a paperwork glitch. Doctors' offices don't pay much to their staff, and they get what they pay for. Call the collection agency right away to document that you disagree with the charges, make sure to get the name of the person you speak with and note the date/ time you spoke. Then, try to get statements from your credit card company that show the charges. Hope this helps, good luck. ~ Lottie

Jim - I agree with what Lottie said, contact the collection agency and document everything! I would also contact that dr's office and ask them for an audit of your account. They need to show you proof that you owe them. They must have that info if they are turning you over to collections and they are the only ones who can call off the collection hounds! Also, as Lottie said, get those credit card statements. Some credit card providors have an annual statement, which might be easier than thumbing through monthly statements.

My husband got all of his sleep apnea equipment through this one company and their billing was horrible. They started sending collection notices and I called them (asked for the billing supervisor) and demanded that they audit the account and it turned out that they owed us a refund!! Of course we never saw it, but at least the collection notices stopped! Needless to say he changed medical supply companies!

Good luck!!
Nanc
:hug:

Thanks Lottie and Nanc!

It turns out that the bill I received is a scam.

Thanks for the update! How is your wife doing?

She is doing much better. The selling of our home last summer reduced her stress significantly. By selling the house we where able to pay off all of our debt, especially medical debt accumulated over a period of 4 years, and still have enough left over to buy a another home out of state (Delaware perhaps) with little to no mortgage. She's happy, still in pain but able to deal with it much better. Thanks for asking! :)

I just received another bill from 2010 from another collection agency collecting from another pain specialist, who we went to for only a consultation (one time visit). I remember Suzy using her medicare card and paying the co-pay with cash. Something is going on and it seems we now have a target on our heads. I payed off all bills, the last remaining ones over a year ago and they were current, no late payments at all. :(

Hey Jim - that is so bizarre. Funny thing is that I just saw a snippet on the news yesterday about these bogus collection agency notices. Glad you found out the other one was a scam before shelling out more money. If you haven't done it lately, I would recommend getting a copy of your credit report (for both you and your wife). You can get them for free at annualcreditreport.com.

My husband started getting collection notices several years ago from cell phone providers, medical providers, etc in Montana. He has never lived anywhere outside of VA and never had a cell plan in his name (they have always been in mine). Anyway, his name was similar to the person who did not pay any of his bills so they tagged him. As soon as one tagged him, all the others followed suit. It was on my husband's credit reports, it was a mess. We only found out when we went to refinance our mortgage. That was quite a shock for us.

That is my fear is when we go to purchase a house then have credit issues after shelling out 10s of thousands of dollars. I'm starting to think this may be a medicare issue where medicare did not pay like they should have, or the docs office staff screwed up at our expense. I have read about staff being incompetent with billing at this particular (one time) doctor's office. I have also heard about others getting stuck with bills belonging to another with the same name. Sometimes, after going through what we have gone through for the last 10 years, is to just move out of the country. But, as the saying goes, the grass is not always greener on the other side.

Is always very important for us to keep all receive and also even parking receipts we get during each appointment ,I keep mostly everything in a box named rsd stuff, funny ,have so many papers and lately I'm putting everything in order by dates, also,copy of dr reports so I built my own profile,became handy for any offices errors,happens once and I learned a bad lesson since then no more undocumented receipt on my file box, hope you don't get such of scams again and by the way,always call dr office to confirm they are actually contacting the right person, blessings to all and gentle hugs,with love Jesika .:grouphug:
Check your credit record, in California for example ,we get some mails saying some dr office stuff used the ss number to get credit ,make sure you are not a fraud victim.
Also verify with Medicare if back then any gap was met and you never receive the notification,all possible scenarios can happen ,make sure you don't let things that way ,good luck.

I just received an email from one of the doctors.

"just forget this, ok?
if you get another bill, just tell me and I will make sure they do
not bill you again."

Be careful folks, scammers exploiting the ill left and right.