The thing that I have seen is that “health insurance” insures that people will continue to get the ineffective, expensive, many times harmful treatment that people have gotten for years. I’m at a loss for why many insurance companies will pay for chiropractors to do massage, physical therapist to do massage, doctors to do massage, but will rarely pay for a massage therapist to do massage. I’ve seen insurance companies pay $15,000 for a brace to immobilize the back of an 11 year old gymnast, ordered by her MD because he didn’t know what else to do. She was in excruciating pain and all of the MRI’s, CAT scans, tests and x-rays showed nothing out of the ordinary. The brace was the last option, in his opinion. I explained to the mother that if she really wanted her daughter to be pain-free and be able to perform at the same level, (or higher), ever again she needed to trust me and let me help her. She trusted me.   

When her daughter was supposed to be in the brace for one more month, (Her prescribed time to be in the brace was 3 months but, thank God, she never put it on.), she competed in and won the overall championship in a national gymnastics competition. She was, and is, completely pain free and has full range of motion. Total cost of treatment was less than $400.00. Compare that with the 15K PLUS the cost of all the tests and office visits that didn’t find anything wrong BUT that the insurance company paid for anyway. This site would look something like ‘War and Peace’ if I included all the stories like this one that I have been personally involved with. Suffice it to say I don’t ‘get’ the insurance industry at all as it relates to massage.

Since writing the last paragraph a thought has occurred to me that makes the insurance industry seem logical after all...The Stock Market. Insurance companies own stock in everything from drug company's, medical supply equipment, etc. The thing about that is they make money...NO MATTER WHAT! If costs are high they raise your rates. If costs are high because your drugs cost more they raise your rates AND profit from the stock price increase. Pretty smart huh?! Doesn't help you a bit though.

One more thought on insurance. One of the questions I ask my clients is this. If your car broke down and you had the choice to bring it to one of two repair shops. One was covered by insurance but they couldn’t fix your car. You would have to bring it back time and time again and it would never get run properly. The other repair shop wasn’t covered by insurance but within a visit or two your car was running smoothly again. Which repair shop would you take your car to? The answer is obvious and so is the point I’m getting at. The problem is that most people wouldn’t stand for the work done by the 1st shop because they NEED THEIR CAR! They paid good money for their car…but you can replace your car. You only get ONE BODY. I know it was ‘free’ but shouldn’t you take better care of your body than you do your car? If what you are doing to rid your body of pain isn’t working, even if insurance will pay for it, PLEASE find something else that will. Whether it is this or something else, find something that works! (There, I’m done.)... Almost.

Having said all of that, we understand that treatment can be expensive and cost prohibitive for some who really need it and rely on insurance to soften the blow. If you would contact your insurance company and have them fax us the forms we would need to fill out to be "in network" we will do that. Our fax # is (512) 244-6231. Sometimes when the moon is full and the stars are aligned insurance will pay for our services if: you have a diagnosis code provided by your doctor; if you have a script from your doctor; if you turn in the insurance form with treatment codes we can give you after your treatment(s)... That's a lot of ifs so let us know if you really need help with getting your insurance company to pay for some treatments.

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Series 1 Continued:
Bruises
Pressure and Duration of Treatment
Where to Start?
Ice or Heat