Hello everyone!
The Current Situation
I’d like to take this time to give you all an update on what’s going on with Cutting Edge during this very tumultuous time when there’s lots of change every minute.
Cutting Edge Allen and Mansfield are open! We are here for our clients who are still coming in. You may be shocked, but we still have 50%-60% of our clients still coming to the facility.
We did shut down our Katy location for now because it did not make sense for the clinic to be open.
Telehealth Therapy
We do have some other great options, though! We have launched telehealth this week, and we are offering OT, PT, and speech through telehealth! We are so excited about this option! This allows us a tremendous opportunity to get inside your home environment and make actual adaptations in training in your environment, where you can participate and learn!
The most important thing for you to know about telehealth is, whether this is for a young kiddo or a school-aged child, we really need a caregiver to be there. The caregiver needs to get the computer set up and to direct the process of getting things going. If the kiddo tends to run off, the caregiver can get them and bring them back.
We have started doing this with some of our young adults, and one of the skills that we’re teaching them is “you cannot leave your workspace without permission!” The parents of our young adult clients are usually in the house, maybe just a room away—but these clients are not flight risks like some of our little guys are.
We are very excited! We have so many activities lined up that we can do virtually! The medium we are using is Zoom, which is HIPAA compliant.
How Telehealth therapy works
For our current Cutting Edge clients, we have a telehealth form that we send out to you via our intake queue. We have to get your permission to do telehealth. We also have to collect payment from a distance, and there’s some information we will need to get from you about what type of computer you have, whether you have a mouse, and what games and supplies you have in your home.
Insurance For Telehealth
We have found that most health insurers are moving towards telehealth and embracing it because we really don’t know when this situation with CoVid-19 will change. However, our one holdout right now is BlueCross BlueShield of Texas. I know many of you have been calling them because we’ve been emailing you and asking you to call. We also know that they’re telling you one thing and us another! They may be telling you that “Sure! We cover telehealth!” But what they’re telling us is that they don’t guarantee payment. I strongly suggest that when you call, you get an authorization number for the phone call. This is very important! An authorization number allows us to go back and track that phone call to see if they’re giving you the same information they’re giving us.
BlueCross Plans
Many of our clients with BlueCross plans in other states have been able to get authorization for telehealth outside of Texas. Our holdout is specifically BlueCross BlueShield of Texas. This is a difficult situation and we do not understand why BlueCross BlueShield of Texas is making it this difficult on families. They will allow you to see a doctor virtually through their MDLIVE, and they will cover virtual mental health visits. They are just not covering therapy visits. We have contacted the department of insurances, we have contacted senators; we have also been on the phone probably 50 hours a week trying to get this resolved for you. Please understand that we are doing the very best we can. We greatly appreciate any help you could give us with this issue! We really want to be able to move forward with telehealth.
If you have a high deductible plan, many of our families are opting to go to telehealth anyway, without that guarantee of payment, because they realize that they’re not going to meet their deductible anyway. They are paying the same amount whether payment is authorized through the insurance company or not.
This is an interesting time, but we are so excited about telehealth! We hope you join us there!
