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June, 2008
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Local Doctor For Disabled Shut Out For Changing Address
By Howard A. Thornton, MD
In lieu of sending bills to Medicare this month for services that I provide via house calls to home-bound developmentally disabled, elderly, and mentally ill patients, I am sending invoices to operators of Board and Care Homes that I serve, accompanied by the following letter:
In his or her logically-challenged mind, some bureaucrat working for Medicare responded to my attempts to notify the Medicare program of a simple change of address last July by informing me that I could only do so by completing a 28-page comprehensive form that took me several weeks to wade through and complete in my spare time.
But instead of them forwarding my checks to me at my new address, as any normal person would do, Medicare informed me that I had lied in filling out the form, by falsely claiming, in answer to one of the questions on the form, that I had never had my medical license revoked or suspended; and that I was attempting to mislead or deceive someone.
However, since I in fact had never had my medical license either revoked or suspended, not even for a nanosecond-a fact which I subsequently double-checked with the Medical Board of California-Medicare had made a simple error in rushing to judgment, and therefore owes me an apology as well as more than $6,000 in checks that have already been made out to me but which the post office will not forward to me as a matter of policy and which Medicare also refuses to forward to me at my new address.
In the meantime I am barred from being paid by the Medicare program as a liar who is presumed guilty until proven innocent, and must wait until sometime in or after July of this year when, I am told, a hearing will be scheduled, some five and a third months after I initially mailed in the 28 page form that Medicare insisted on having me fill out.
For now I am receiving no money whatsoever from Medicare for serving Medicare recipients, whose bodies do not remain healthy until proven ill.
If you agree that our Federal Government has got it backwards, and should release my long-overdue checks to me which have now been languishing in Medicare's Chico office for eight months so far (and counting), please write and or phone Congresswomen Barbara Lee and/or Barbara Boxer c/o U.S. Congress, Washington DC, to correct this injustice.
All I am told so far is that Medicare's appeal office in Chico has no telephone (I am not making this up), so that there is no live human being with whom I can explain the very simple misunderstanding on Medicare's part in order to expedite the handling of my case, and that my only recourse therefore is to state my case in writing, which I have already done.
For the moment, I am on the cusp of starvation trying to live on what little I get from my monthly Social Security income: so I would appreciate a loan in the amount on this invoice to tide me over until Medicare comes to its senses.
A decade ago I went through a similar sort of conflict with Medicare, in which I had to wait several years of going through numerous levels of appeals until at last I reached the level of administrative law judge, at which point I prevailed, with 1397 out of 1400 charts that were reviewed being ruled in my favor.
So when you fight Medicare, it is like fighting city hall: even if you win the battle you can nevertheless lose the war quite easily. That is what I am afraid might be happening again this time.
Mind you, I am still able to serve your clients; I am just not able to get paid for my troubles of doing so at this point in time.
Your voluntary donation in the above amount will help keep gas in my car and food on my table and my cell phone account active so that I can continue to answer your phone calls within 100 to 15 seconds, as I have always done for the past 30+ years.
Is our current so-called Health Care System for elderly, developmentally disabled and mentally ill citizens a train wreck, or what?
Has it crossed anyone's mind that if these patients don't get my services they will be more likely to die off much sooner than they would otherwise? And then the State and Federal Governments won't have to pay not just their medical bills but their room and board expenses also? Or isn't that the general idea? In which case am I the one who has got it backwards?
