Are doctors aware of billing procedures?

I haven’t blogged as much the past few weeks. Seems the summer is keeping me incredibly busy. I’ve been on the road more in the last two months more than…well, in some time. And it seems like it won’t slow down for another few weeks—at least until the kids go back to school (yes—that date is Aug. 7, FYI).

But I’m not here to talk about that this time. I’m here to gripe a little about doctors. Well, not so much doctors as their accounting procedures.

In general, I like doctors. I’ve had several friends over the years who were doctors and enjoyed their company. One, Dr. Kevin Gray, an Ophthalmologist in Florence, Alabama, is a civil war reenactor and is the one responsible for recruiting me into that hobby. We’ve fought agin’ many Yanks! He also told me some pretty interesting eye stories, including having to remove a pencil from an eyeball! Yuck!

I complained not long ago about the time spent in waiting rooms. Truthfully, I don’t mind waiting in the case of an emergency. However, I do mind waiting because of poor scheduling, which I suspect is the case more often than not. I read an account recently of a lawyer who billed the doctor for his time spent waiting on the doctor. Seems he won in court. I’m not one to support litigation, but I was secretly cheering for that one.

That’s still not what I want to gripe about though.

Why is it that when you go to ONE office and see ONE doctor, you end up with thirteen different bills? How does that happen and just what is the doctor paying his accounting and secretarial staff to do?

I think they often use these practices as a way to pull you in and make you think whatever procedure won’t cost as much as it ends up costing. Granted, they tell you what their cost is, but can’t tell you the other costs. And why is it that it can take weeks or months for the “other service providers” to bill you?

BJ recently had surgery and once it was done we collected the bills, created a budget, checked with the appropriate doctor’s office, and moved on. Later, we received a bill from an anesthesiologist. Later still, from the hospital itself! We already had one from the doctor and from that doctor’s office. Then we received one from a lab for “labwork.” What exactly does that mean?

I’m definitely not ready to go to Obamacare/socialized medicine. Too many doctors who’ve been there done that warn us of the dangers of socialized medicine. But something really needs to be done to streamline the process. Maybe if they’d pay the CEOs a little less money, they could pay accountants money to learn out to streamline billing for patients/customers.

Or maybe they just need to bring in Ross Perot.

When the mice are away

For the next 4 days, both kids are out of town enjoying their summer, which means that momma and daddy have the house alone—a very rare event in the last 14 years. Brett is on his yearly “visit Paco and Magoo” trip and Brittany is attending Camp Electric, her very first ever I-don’t-know-anybody camp. Last week I didn’t blog as we were on a “staycation” and I tried my best to “stay” away from the computer—for the most part anyway. Actually, it was BJ’s vacation, but the rest of it enjoyed it with her, especially the swimming and homemade ice cream.

Brett has come to really love going to Arkansas so that he can be “Paco’s shadow.” He absolutely loves going everywhere my Dad does, and will actually help Dad work! I need to figure out how to get him to do that here, too!

While Brittany has been to “camp” before, it’s always been with a group of kids she knew, or at least knew some of them. Camp Electric is a camp she wanted to attend because of the music emphasis, but as time drew near she realized she was going and didn’t know anyone else going…and was going to be rooming with girls she didn’t know. So she got nervous. She was very nervous when we actually arrived to drop her off in Nashville. I talked to her tonight, though, and she’s already made a small group of “friends.”

We had some sad news last week: Goldy, our part-lab dog died. We got him with his sister Blackie back in the summer of 2005. He was hit a car and broke his bottom jaw in summer 2006…then Blackie disappeared. While we have no idea what happened to her, I think someone took her (more on that at a later date). Anyway, we don’t know why Goldy died, but the family is sad.

A bit of good news for me: I’ve been accepted into the MLA in Creative Writing program at Spalding University in Kentucky. It is a low-residency program which means that I’ll go once per semester and spend a week or so on campus while completing the rest of my semester work from home. It’s a program tailor-made for folks like me! Of course, my dissertation work will be a book length work! I’m very excited.

I’d been accepted into the PhD program in Creative Writing at USM. It’s a very good program and one that I was very interested in. However, after digging deeper into it, I realized I was going to have to spend the next 3 years AWAY from my family. Since the kids are 8 and 14, that would put them at 11 and 17 by the time I finish. I just wasn’t prepared to miss that much and that part of their lives!

Off to work!

Do Not Call!

For years the jokes have always rang out with the truths of the phone ringing just as you sit down to supper with the family. As you think twice about answering (we no longer answer the phone at mealtime unless we’re expecting a call) you pick it up only to discover someone wants to sell you something…and they won’t let you off the phone!

I’ve loved the “Do Not Call” list since day 1; thought it was a fantastic idea. We signed up for it immediately and our solicitation calls went from about 3 per week to about 2 per year. Each time we’ve moved—and those of you who know us know that we’ve done it more times that we wish the last few years—we’ve immediately put our new number on the DNC list…wait, I’d better write that out before my Democrat friends get the wrong idea!

So why is it that the Mississippi Highway Order of the Fraternal Police can continue to call me over and over and over again even though my telephone number has been on the DO NOT CALL list for months? Why are they exempt from solicitation calls? “This is not a solicitation call,” said the voice on the other end when I asked that same question. Excuse me? You just asked for a donation—isn’t that what a solicitation call is?

Once the solicitor asked me if I liked feeling safe. What? Gee, but that sure sounded like a threat to me! I told him I had my own gun, thank you very much! It actually made me quite mad that a police solicitor would use a tactic like that. And I like the keepers of the law! I have several good friends who are lawmen and I hold them in high regard and on the list of my very best friends. I know they wouldn’t use tactics like that, so why should the Fraternal Order of the MHP?

I really did tell the solicitor I had my own gun. Back before the calls stopped, I used to like to talk to the solicitors. BJ would just say no and hang up. You could hear their voices talking until the click of the receiver. But I liked talking to them. Well, not really, but I figured if they were going to waste my time then I was going to waste theirs.

Once a solicitor called and told me about some vacation. He asked me if I thought it sounded good. I told him it did. He proceeded to tell me more and asked me if I thought it sounded like a good deal. I assured him it did. He asked for my credit card number and I refused. Surprised, he mentioned something else and I asked him to explain it. He did, and then asked if I didn’t think that sounded good. I assured him that I thought it sounded wonderful. He asked for my credit card number again. I refused. He asked me why I wouldn’t give him the number so I told him I didn’t want him having my credit card number. He assured me it was only to hold whatever it was he was trying to sell me. I responded that I understood and he asked again. I refused again.

HE hung up!