We have an 8-year-old autistic daughter who has been seeing Dr. Gary Feldman at the Stramski Center since she was around 4 years old. My concerns are with the Stramski Center and how the office handles appointments and insurance authorizations.
Almost every year, we get a call just a few days before our daughter's scheduled appt saying it needs to be canceled or rescheduled because either the doctor is unavailable or there is an insurance authorization issue. It is extremely frustrating to deal with the same thing over and over.
A few weeks ago, we were told that Dr. Feldman would not be available for our upcoming August appt. They offered us an appt with a nurse practitioner instead. My husband and I agreed because we needed an evaluation soon so we can move forward with getting approval for an AAC device for our daughter. At this point, we don't care who sees her, we just need the evaluation done as soon as possible.
Then this morning, I received a call from Griselda, whom I believe is a front desk receptionist. She told me they had to cancel our appt for next week because our insurance had not approved it. She told me to call UnitedHealthcare myself to find out why it was denied. She also said the nurse practitioner wasn't available that day anyway.
WTH... here we go again.
This has happened every single time we have appts with Dr Feldman. Last year, and in previous years, Griselda/Stramski center calls us to cancel appts and we had to call UnitedHealthcare and Regal Medical Group ourselves, spending hours being transferred from one representative to another just to figure out what was hell was going on. They told us that the coding submitted for the insurance authorizations were incorrect, which was why the requests was denied every time . So all these years the problem was on the Stramski Center's end or with whoever handles their insurance processing. Whoever handles insurance processing or coding at Stramski is incompetent.
So when I was told today that I needed to call UnitedHealthcare myself, my question was: why is this our responsibility? If the Stramski Center submitted the authorization request, shouldn't they be following up with UnitedHealthcare or Regal Medical Group to find out what happened and what needs to be corrected? Isn't that the receptionist job???
I've never had this kind of experience with my other doctors' offices. When I need a referral or something needs to be handled with insurance, the doctor's office usually takes care of it. I don't understand why Stramski doesn't do this and repeatedly puts the burden on us as parents to call the health insurance ourselves .
My husband and I both work and have to request time off in advance for our daughter's appts. We had already requested time off for next week, and now we have to cancel those plans, reschedule the appt, and request more time off all over again.
And this isn't just a routine appointment that can be pushed back. Our daughter needs this evaluation for her AAC device, and there is a deadline for submitting it. If we don't get the evaluation completed in time, her AAC application could be canceled, meaning we may have to start the entire process over again. So fyi, this appt was scheduled 7 months ago. 7 months ago!!
So Because the appointment was canceled, we are losing valuable time in getting our daughter the communication device she needs. On top of that, we are gonna have to deal with hours of calling our insurances and being transferred around to different reps. This is too much stress.
I understand that insurance can be complicated and that not every denial is the medical office's fault. However, when the same issues keep happening year after year, and we have previously been told that incorrect coding contributed to a denial, it is hard not to question how insurance authorizations are being handled at Stramski.
If there is an issue with coding or paperwork, someone at Stramski needs to take responsibility for making sure it is submitted correctly. If an authorization is denied, the office should make an effort to find out why and help resolve the issue before canceling a patient's appt!
And also, To Stramski, if there is an authorization problem, please notify families a month or two in advance. Calling us only a few days before an appt and canceling is wrong! As parents of a special-needs child, we already have enough on our plate. We shouldn't have to fight this hard just to get a scheduled evaluation completed.
Anyways , I highly DO NOT recommend this place. We will be going somewhere else . Very incompetent! read more