I do not normally post reviews, but I thought I would share my negative experience with Inline Spine, hopefully for the benefit of others.
*Summary*
1. Dr. Livingston coerced me into months of expensive treatment I didn't need and never diagnosed me with anything, which is highly unethical, caused great amounts of personal stress, and led to the never-ending "how do I pay for this" debacle. 2. The office is extremely uncooperative with answering my simple questions or providing me documentation on billing. Dr. Livingston omitted very significant parts of the billing process when I explicitly asked about it, and after almost a full year since treatment began, I am still stuck trying to figure out how to pay for these bills, with absolutely no help from them.
*Details*
I was in a very minor car accident last January (barely a scratch on my car), but I felt very stiff in the shoulders and upper back, so I made an appointment with Dr. Livingston. I recently graduated from college, just moved to the area, and I had never been in a car accident before, so when I met Dr. Livingston and the staff, I was happy to be around such nice and friendly people, and I put my trust in them. When I mentioned that I was in a minor car accident, Dr. L explained that I needed to file a claim immediately since I wasn't at fault in the accident, and even my minor stiffness was likely an injury from it. He assured me that since I wasn't at fault that the car insurance would cover everything, but I would need to follow his treatment plan in order to have it covered because otherwise it would look like I wasn't following medical advice. In addition, the office would take care of all the insurance stuff, so I had nothing to worry about. He never told me exactly what the treatment plan was, just told me to show up again on Wednesday, so I did. I ended up going twice a week, and when I asked for how long, he suggested probably till the end of March, so about 2 months total. That's fine, except I didn't get better. So at the end of March, Dr. said to keep coming until the end of April. And then the end of May. By now my back was bothering me in places that hadn't bothered me at all at the beginning. I did hours upon hours of physical therapy, stim, traction, adjustments, massages, you name it. But since I was going twice a week, my body never had time to recover, so I was in pain and always uncomfortable 24/7. Once it hit May, we were approaching 5 months, and I wasn't feeling any improvement, so I wanted to end treatment. Terrified I would be penalized for ending treatment and be on the hook for all the bills, I contacted my insurance company, and they informed me that I had the right to end treatment at any time. Sheds light on the first lie Dr. told me. So the next visit, I told him I wanted to stop treatment, maybe get a second opinion. Instead of respecting my decision, he decided to prescribe me for some X-rays at the nearby hospital, and basically made it sound like something was seriously wrong with me and if I wasn't better by now, then I might need treatment for the rest of the year. I left the office basically in tears. The funny thing is, Dr. never diagnosed me with anything specific, it was only vague "lesions" and "scar tissue" and a month after I stopped going, I actually feel a lot better, nearly pain-free. So maybe parts of the treatment did work, but clearly my body just needed time to recover from the constant bashing. A couple days after my last visit, I received a notice from my car insurance company that the medical coverage was exhausted. I then had a horrible crash-course about insurance companies and PA law, and I now worried that I was on the hook for thousands of dollars in chiro bills. I am still dealing with all the insurance claims and trying to figure it out, no thanks to Dr. who never gave me any heads-up that my coverage would actually NOT cover everything. Perhaps he does not treat everyone this way, but I definitely feel that I was taken advantage of by Dr. Livingston because I am young and was involved in a car accident (anyone hear cha-ching?). He never diagnosed me or explained his treatment plan, and he never made himself available to answer my questions (he would leave the room immediately after adjustments before I even had a chance to open my mouth). I was roped into 5 months of treatments that interfered with my work schedule and did not improve my quality of life, only to find myself mired in the middle of complicated insurance claims involving thousands of dollars that I know nothing about because I never even saw the bills. Suffice it to say, I never got the X-rays, and I am never planning on visiting this chiropractor again. read more
