(from LabCard literature)
LabCard Questions & Answers |
Ben Dover's Comments |
What is Lab Card?
The Lab Card Program is a new member-driven benefit that allows
insured to obtain free, covered outpatient laboratory testing
when their specimens are sent to LabOne for testing |
The concept is to lower insurance companies' costs of doing business
by denying physicians any compensation for professional services
provided in connection with obtaining and interpreting lab work. |
|
What is different about the Lab Card process for obtaining laboratory
work?
Currently, when you visit your physician, the specimen is collected
by your physician's medical staff and sent to a laboratory for
testing. The lab then bills your physician, and the physician bills you at a higher rate.
Lab Card is a patient-driven program. When your doctor tells you that you need lab work, it's up to you to request that they collect your specimens and
send them to LabOne for testing. Instead of billing your physician for tests, Lab One will bill
The New England directly. Your testing is FREE when the specimens
are sent to LabOne. |
"...the physician bills you at a higher rate." Well, DUH! Does MacDonald's mark up its hamburgers? Does Dillard's mark
up Levi's? For that matter, does LabOne mark up its lab work above
its own cost. Of course! No business can remain in business without
marking up its products. Take away the markups and the doors soon
close leaving all the employees out of work.
What's different is Lab Card's clever twist of recruiting patients into the scam, causing them to put pressure on their doctors to eviscerate
their office income by giving up all lab revenues while continuing
to bear the cost of providing the same level of professional staffing
and service.
|
Is use of the Lab Card mandatory?
The Lab Card Program is optional. However, if an insured chooses
not to use their Lab Card, they will have to pay any applicable
deductible, coinsurance or copay portion of their lab work. |
The subliminal messages to patients are "You don't have to use this program; but you're a fool if you don't. If your
greedy (rich) doctor refuses to particpate, he's just trying trying
to get more money from you." |
Who pays for the laboratory testing when Lab Card is used?
Because LabOne offered laboratory testing at a significant savings
over other labs, The New England is able to cover the full cost
of the covered laboratory tests. |
The question should be "Who pays the doctor when Lab Card is used?" The answer is "The doctor is paid nothing at all"!
The odds are that New England has some sort of direct financial
stake in the LabOne laboratory, either a partial ownership interest or some sort of kickback
scheme. Otherwise why would they put so much pressure on doctors
to send our patients' lab work all the way to Kansas? |
What if a physician wants to perform the testing in his or her
own office, or have the specimens sent to a laboratory other than
LabOne?
Insureds may continue to have their lab work performed at another
laboratory; however, they will not receive free testing as they
would if the specimens were sent to LabOne. Insureds will be responsible
for any applicable deductibles, coinsurance, and copays. |
The messages to patients are "If you don't demand that your doctor
agree to give you 'free' lab work, you're a dope. If your doctor
refuses to participate in this program and ship all his lab work
all the way up to Kansas every day, he's just being greedy and
insensitive to your financial concerns; so you should change doctors." |
|
BEN DOVER SEZ:
There's no way my office is going to buy into this scam. I've worked with my local lab for years. I know the pathologists
who run it; I trust their results; and they're only a phone call
away when I need a question answered. I can see no valid reason
for shipping my patients' lab work to Kansas (Kansas??!!), and with reimbursements for all other services being steadily
eroded, I simply cannot afford to give even the small profit my
office makes on lab work.
A doctor might be tempted to rationalize himself into accepting
the LabOne card from "just a few" patients rather than hassle
with them about it; but the problem with beginning to accept the
LabOne card is the same as trying "just a little" cocaine or accepting
"just a few" managed care patients. Once these programs become
entrenched in our offices and the patients get used to them, it's
always much harder to stop than if we all had just said "NO" in
the beginning.
I use this web site constantly as a teaching resource for my patients.
Not only do I post printouts of the current "Insurance Company Comparison" page in all my exam rooms, but I also use these printouts as
visual aids when I'm speaking to each patient about the details
of the current managed care crisis. I give all my patients a handout
encouraging them to study this web site carefully. From now on, when someone tries to hand me or my staff a LabOne
Card, all we have to do is refer them directly to this page you're
reading right now to explain why we don't accept LabOne - that's
going to save me and my staff a lot of time.
DOCTOR, please consider what a valuable teaching resource this
Burnout web site could be for your patients, too. |
