Dopers, I’m trying to figure out whether or not I should continue receiving therapeutic counseling off-the-record. I am currently not allowing BCBS (blue cross/blue shield) to cover my sessions because paperwork would be filed if I had BCBS fork over monies towards these sessions. I am a student today. My concern is that within the next 5yrs I will be entering the field as a new health professional and I wonder/worry if insurance companies I would approach to give me liability and malpractice insurance would USE my private medical record as part of screening me for their insurance.
Basically, will my sessions, if I start allowing them to be documented, remain private? Or will these documented sessions be used to inflate premiums or even deny me prof. insurance later? Here’s hoping some of you have some answers or suggestions.
The company I work for was talking to to an insurance company and was trying to get a quote of the cost of insuring the employees .One of the employee’s had a lot medical problems. It turns out the company was telling
these insurance people what medical problems the employees have had. The insurance comapny didn’t want this guy on the plan. I don’t think it is right for your employer to
tell others what medical problems you have had.
I don’t know about malpractice insurance, but for life/disability, you have to sign something saying it’s okay for them to check out your medical records. There’s also the MIB, which is a storehouse of knowledge. I’m not sure there is a way to truthfully do it “off-the-record.” And, lying on an insurance application can void the insurance.
seth I said specifically ‘content’. Perhaps (I’m not sure about) fact of counseling may not be priveledged, however, the content is confidential (as in if the poster was ambivalent about their sexuality). A release of info about your medical records for life insurance IME does not include a consent for info of counseling session specifics.
But don’t the insurance companies want to see the content? If someone went for grief counseling after both parents died in a car crash, that doesn’t paint a person of bad character, whereas a complete suicidal whacko-without-a-cause would.
If you can afford to pay for the counseling without insurance covering part or all of it, I’d say continue to do so. Otherwise, you do run a small risk of breach of confidentiality, not to mention the insurance company mucking around with your treatment in the name of “helping” you.
As far as I know, the content of sessions is priveledged information. The police cannot, for example, force a counselor to discuss the content of a session - so if you’ve confessed in your session that you feel really bad about murdering your dad, the counselor is prohibited by doctor/patient relationship from repeating the info. It differs if you talk about planning to kill your dad, then the burden shifts to protecting, so the counselor has a ‘duty to warn’.
And that’s for the legal system - in general, I’d believe the legal system has more ability to access stuff than an insurance co.
But I’ll check with my sources in the Community Mental Health field later, just to make sure.
(I use ‘release of info’ forms that are patterned after those used in the CMH field, and the info released is very specific, it details ‘reason to know’ and length of time. generally, I was only allowed to check that the person was attending counseling, again this was for the cj field).
If you are concerned have your therapist place a note in your file that you are to be directly contacted in case of a release of info. Generally speaking the most an insurance co can get is “did they recieve services” and possibly “what’s the diagnosis”. As far as case notes, therapists are generally cautious as to how detailed they are.
So, content is generally protected, the fact that you recieved services at all is necessary info for the insurance co to have in order to make payments.
Let me clarify…I am not so worried about future medical insurance companies refusing me insurance for my own trips to the doctor, etc. I am concerned that when I begin my practice as a professional health dudette that my business partners (malprac and liability insurance co.s) will USE my medical history as a way of judging whether or not they should back my new career. This would include both content of my current therapy sessions and diagnosis (I found out that diagnosis is ONLY required, at least for my state, if a medical insurance provider’s funds are used. If I pay for it myself a diagnosis is optional.)
Basically, will having my current therapy become DOCUMENTED because I involve my own medical insurance become cannon fodder for future business partners of my future profession. Will it adversely affect my business by either being used as a justification of high premiums or denial of insurance?
I’m at a loss to find good sites that might explain this type of scenario.
Diagnosis is a real potential for them to find out, the content - they’d have to get you to sign a very generalized release, and even then, as noted the case notes would probably be fairly spartan. If you’re at all concerned, 1. make sure your current therapist has notation in your file as suggested, 2. see an attorney about other options.
One lesson I have learned from this world is Cover Your Ass. If this worries you now, it will worry you later. Continue to pay for your own sessions, and keep them off your record until you are in practice and maybe even until you are ready to strike out on your own and set up your own practice.
Never willingly give someone ammunition to use against you, is what I’m trying to say. With the cost of liability ins. and the other coverage you will need, why give them the opportunity to so much as even charge you a higher premium. And yes, insurance underwriters have full access to medical records. Not content, but certainly diagnosis.
Aenea. (and everyone else) good point. Hadn’t thought of it that cut and dried. CYOA is an optimal way of handling this situation. I will have to just keep on the way I’ve been until I have better information. However, knowing how beauracracies change the rules every few years…it might not matter now to ins. co’s but later it might.
Thanks for the mirror.
If anyone else knows ins. co. details and perspectives…let’s hear from you.