Comments on: Autism, Medical Expenses, and Tax Time in Our Family http://www.bothhandsandaflashlight.com/2009/03/02/autism-medical-expenses-and-tax-time-in-our-family/ Parenting, Autism, and the Pursuit of Being Awesome Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:51:42 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= By: Tim http://www.bothhandsandaflashlight.com/2009/03/02/autism-medical-expenses-and-tax-time-in-our-family/comment-page-1/#comment-22382 Tim Sat, 28 Aug 2010 03:53:33 +0000 http://www.bothhandsandaflashlight.com/?p=700#comment-22382 I know of a number of people who've had to go into public assistance for insurance. It is possible - at least here and maybe in the rest of the U.S. - to get just your kids on state insurance plans for children, which have quite a bit higher income limits than Medicaid. Getting children covered should get somewhat easier once some of the new healthcare laws take effect, at least I hope so. The therapy practice we went to before we got into county school services I think billed about $150 per 50 minute session. When our insurance ran out, they actually cut us a deal. Sometimes you can negotiate a separate cash price or pay for sessions in bulk or whatever. We did that with them. It still obviously wasn't cheap, but it saved us a lot of money. County school services are included in the IEP and all that, and he gets a lot of work in the Pre-K classroom he's in (a separate classroom for autistic kids - 8 students, 3 teachers). From there, we do a lot of it ourselves at the house. Because we've chosen to do the work ourselves outside the school hours, our expenses have been a lot less this year. We do have some luxury to do this, though, because his school, teachers, and therapists are so great and because his various needs fall within a range we feel like we can manage OK ourselves without much additional outside help. I know for some people, this simply isn't possible. I agree that the entire health insurance process is a mess, and most definitely a corrupt one. I'm holding on to faith that new rules and mandates for autism coverage that are slowly being enacted state-by-state will help. Biomedical therapies are a mess unto themselves. All the fly-by-night snake oil salespeople along with people who I think mean well but have convinced themselves that their truly bizarre idea is a real therapy have ruined it for the therapies that either are legitimate or are at least safe and potentially helpful enough to try. Insurance is never going to cover all the options, nor should they. People are already abusing the market with junk treatments or outright dangerous ones, and that would just make it worse. Along with this breakneck pursuit of making quick dollars by preying on people's fears, there's no way to quickly test the validity of therapies that seem to be showing up in the market daily, and the whole thing is completely unregulated. All this just makes it easy for insurers to dismiss the whole thing, baby and bath water. So until there are hard and fast studies documenting and proving a particular therapy's validity, don't expect the insurance climate to change much. Still hoping that Sensory Processing Disorder makes it into the official list of diagnoses. That would be huge leap forward for changes to insurance. Yeah, the complaints of many other parents of non-special needs kids just drill into me sometimes. I'm trying to rein in my negativity some, but many days I just want to go off and tell them why I think they need to get some perspective. (To put it nicely...) I know of a number of people who’ve had to go into public assistance for insurance. It is possible – at least here and maybe in the rest of the U.S. – to get just your kids on state insurance plans for children, which have quite a bit higher income limits than Medicaid. Getting children covered should get somewhat easier once some of the new healthcare laws take effect, at least I hope so.

The therapy practice we went to before we got into county school services I think billed about $150 per 50 minute session. When our insurance ran out, they actually cut us a deal. Sometimes you can negotiate a separate cash price or pay for sessions in bulk or whatever. We did that with them. It still obviously wasn’t cheap, but it saved us a lot of money. County school services are included in the IEP and all that, and he gets a lot of work in the Pre-K classroom he’s in (a separate classroom for autistic kids – 8 students, 3 teachers). From there, we do a lot of it ourselves at the house. Because we’ve chosen to do the work ourselves outside the school hours, our expenses have been a lot less this year. We do have some luxury to do this, though, because his school, teachers, and therapists are so great and because his various needs fall within a range we feel like we can manage OK ourselves without much additional outside help. I know for some people, this simply isn’t possible.

I agree that the entire health insurance process is a mess, and most definitely a corrupt one. I’m holding on to faith that new rules and mandates for autism coverage that are slowly being enacted state-by-state will help. Biomedical therapies are a mess unto themselves. All the fly-by-night snake oil salespeople along with people who I think mean well but have convinced themselves that their truly bizarre idea is a real therapy have ruined it for the therapies that either are legitimate or are at least safe and potentially helpful enough to try. Insurance is never going to cover all the options, nor should they. People are already abusing the market with junk treatments or outright dangerous ones, and that would just make it worse. Along with this breakneck pursuit of making quick dollars by preying on people’s fears, there’s no way to quickly test the validity of therapies that seem to be showing up in the market daily, and the whole thing is completely unregulated. All this just makes it easy for insurers to dismiss the whole thing, baby and bath water. So until there are hard and fast studies documenting and proving a particular therapy’s validity, don’t expect the insurance climate to change much. Still hoping that Sensory Processing Disorder makes it into the official list of diagnoses. That would be huge leap forward for changes to insurance.

Yeah, the complaints of many other parents of non-special needs kids just drill into me sometimes. I’m trying to rein in my negativity some, but many days I just want to go off and tell them why I think they need to get some perspective. (To put it nicely…)

]]> By: Kirsten http://www.bothhandsandaflashlight.com/2009/03/02/autism-medical-expenses-and-tax-time-in-our-family/comment-page-1/#comment-22325 Kirsten Fri, 27 Aug 2010 10:08:33 +0000 http://www.bothhandsandaflashlight.com/?p=700#comment-22325 Its just amazing how much they charge for speech therapy. Seriously, a half hour of therapy costs more than a doctor visit...$186 per half hour here. I dont know what you pay, but here in northern Minnesota its really economically depressed (i.e. more so than everywhere else, pretty much). Because good jobs are scarce here and I didnt make enough money, I pretty much had to quit working and get on public health assistance or else we couldnt afford it...plain and simple. Now I just do some work from home to try to make ends almost meet. No matter what, when you are a "good" autistic parent, you will be poor. No one will help you pay for it, and there is no one else to take your child to therapy (as in resources for people like me who dont have any physically able family members)...so you will put your financial wellness to bed for a long time for your childs sake. Its absolutely unforgiveable that most insurance is so bad for most people that they have to pay for their therapies out of pocket. Plus the biomedical that no one will cover, its just heartless. I totally agree with you. We all do what we have to do to get our children what they need, but when I hear parents whine about paying for school clothes and diapers...I guess I want to smack them a little bit. Its just amazing how much they charge for speech therapy. Seriously, a half hour of therapy costs more than a doctor visit…$186 per half hour here. I dont know what you pay, but here in northern Minnesota its really economically depressed (i.e. more so than everywhere else, pretty much). Because good jobs are scarce here and I didnt make enough money, I pretty much had to quit working and get on public health assistance or else we couldnt afford it…plain and simple. Now I just do some work from home to try to make ends almost meet. No matter what, when you are a “good” autistic parent, you will be poor. No one will help you pay for it, and there is no one else to take your child to therapy (as in resources for people like me who dont have any physically able family members)…so you will put your financial wellness to bed for a long time for your childs sake.

Its absolutely unforgiveable that most insurance is so bad for most people that they have to pay for their therapies out of pocket. Plus the biomedical that no one will cover, its just heartless. I totally agree with you. We all do what we have to do to get our children what they need, but when I hear parents whine about paying for school clothes and diapers…I guess I want to smack them a little bit.

]]>