Most Americans pay a significant amount of money each month on insurance premiums (with those costs increasing with each passing year). These monthly payments are essentially for the privilege of “reduced” contracted fees with in network providers in the form of “co-payments”. Does this actually save you money or could it be costing you more in the long run?
As an “out-of-network” provider, we generally call insurance companies to find out if patients have “out-of-network benefits”. While doing this we regularly ask what their “in-network” benefits are as well. More and more, we are finding out that people have $40-$50 co-payments for office visits and many are limited to around 12 visits per year. Adjustments in our office are $40-$50, so it makes little sense to bill the insurance company if there is essentially “no benefit”. Plus, going to an in-network provider for your 12 visits with added therapies may be a benefit, but to continue with care and the therapies may cost you significantly more than your $40 co-pay. Most “out-of-network” benefits are in the form of “co-insurance” payments, where, after a deductible is met, the insurance company pays a percentage of the fee and the patient is responsible for the remainder, i.e. 60/40%. On a $40 adjustment charge, 40% = $16 – less than even the lowest co-payments we’ve heard of on in-network benefits.
Another issue to consider in this discussion is that running to the doctor with every sniffle and ache, even with a co-payment, only increases your health care costs. You are a miraculous self-healing, self-regulating being. Yes, symptoms of dis-ease are uncomfortable – I’ll be the first to agree with you, but these symptoms are your body “doing its job”! Cold and flu symptoms, back pain and headaches, high blood pressure and hormone imbalance aren’t signs that you’re deficient in some pharmaceutical drug! They’re signs that you may have made some less-than-optimal choices in your life and you’ve let physical, chemical, mental and emotional stress interfere with the flow of life in your body! The good news is, you can always begin to make better decisions! YOU are responsible for, and in charge of, YOUR health! Begin taking control of your life and your health TODAY! No one else will do it for you.
“Medicine is the study of disease and what causes man to die. Chiropractic is the study of health and what causes man to live!”
-B.J. Palmer
