Is there a new prescription?

Therapists very often ask us if there is a new treatment plan ready for their client….but basically there is no need to ask unless you have a feeling that something is amis.

One of our top priorities is notifying you and the patient when they get a new treatment plan. This is one of the first things we do every day, even before returning phone calls. We call or text the client to let them know of the new plan and we send you the plan in the official email thread. We usually get these out within 1 business day of receiving them (keeping in mind that we’re closed Fridays.) What I’m getting at is that if we have not already sent you the plan, its very unlikely that we have it.

There’s always a chance that something falls through the cracks on our end, so its not that you can never ask us…but if you ask, tell us why you think there’s a new plan. If you’re just asking us to check for checkings sake, its making more work for us.

The main exception for this is Federal work comp. If you’re asking about a federal work comp client, please make that clear when you ask. For federal work comp cases, our office is the one who gets the prescription approved, and we can check the status at any time in the federal system.

Otherwise, our job starts when we we receive the prescription and ends when we send the final report for that prescription. Sometimes a doctor will request more treatment based on our recommendation, sometimes they will want to re-evaluate the client. There is little to nothing our office can do in between sending the final report and receiving the next treatment plan. It falls to the client in this case to advocate for themselves and find out what needs to happen. If they think we should have a new plan, they might need to call their doctor, they might need to call their nurse case manager or adjuster and find out where the hang-up is. This is not work that we can effectively do for the client especially because they are often wrong about there being a new plan approved.

Here’s what often happens: A work comp doctor tells the client they are going to order more massage. The client doesn’t realize that it takes up to a week for the doctors staff to write up a treatment plan. Then, the plan has to be approved by their adjuster and this can take time. It can take a day, but more often than not it takes multiple weeks, sometimes even months.

If the client is certain that a plan has been approved AND sent to us, please have them call us at the BIMN administrative office and we’ll see what we can figure out. Every now and then we do lose a plan on our end but it is extremely rare.

If the client wants to come to an appointment before we receive their plan, they can pay you out of pocket and we can refund them if/when a plan valid for that service date is received. Usually when there is a delay in approving a plan, the coverage is retroactive to the start date specified on the plan.