Hello everyone I am sorry for my absence from the forum. I promise to post more regularly and try to answer or comment more often.
I want to discuss a very pasionate issue in regards to scolisos care.
THE MONEY ISSUE!!!!!! Especially with the current economy this is a big topic. I am going to touch on some issues and hopefully maybe help you seen this from another perspective

Scoliosis care is an investment just like that car the young lady described a 97 Honda. A Honda is a great investment in regards to transportation and dependability. The funny thing is you will invest on average $2000 year in maintenance and the average person will by a new car every 7 years. That is $14,000 into a piece of metal that you are going to throw away in 7 years.
When we talk in terms of health almost no one invest this much into their own health? Why?
When we are looking at the progressive condition of scoliosis or any other condition we have to ask our self some questions.

1) What do you want your health to look like 20 -50 years from now?
2) what do you want your life to look like?
3) What do you want to activity levels to be like?
4) What are you goals?

Once you know the answers to these long term health goals then you and your doctor can develop a plan of action to reach these goals. One thing I do know is with a progressive condition like scoliosis if left untreated you most likely are not going to be able to reach your health goals. Your activity levels will become less and your will begin to age faster physiologically than chronologically. It is always your call but please look at the future further than a few months or even a few years. You can take the time now or you can wait until the only time you have is devoted to trying to resolve your health condition.
People all over the world get into situations where they do not have the financial means to obtain what they want or need. The people who obtain these things figure out a way to achieve their goals. They are persistent and non accepting of their current reality. They figure out a way to invest into their most important assets their health. Without it you have nothing. Here are a few ways I have seen patients obtain payment for their care.
1) loan from bank
2) loan from friend or family member
3) take money out of their retirement
4) health one financial
5) care credit
6) fundraisers at church
7) fundraiser at local tavern
8) get a second mortgage on house
9) line of credit
10) analysis their spending and see where they can save
so be creative in finding a way
"A foolish man will spend his youth sacrificing his health to increase his wealth....
…then waste his golden years sacrificing his wealth to improve his health "
.............I think this is from Mark Twain

Sincerely,
Dr Mark N. Berry
1442 Hwy 31 Vestavia Hills, AL 35216
205-533-8972
www.alabamascoliosiscenter.com

Great topic Mark.

I believe that one of the big hurdles in health care is the difficulty of measuring value of care. Everybody can see the cost, but seeing the value of care can be something else.

Is the CLEAR treatment covered by insurance? Hopefully people have health insurance so they wouldn't have to get into debt to look after their health, especially in the current constrained financial climate. I'm sure no-one would advocate that.

Originally Posted by Goldfinch

Is the CLEAR treatment covered by insurance? Hopefully people have health insurance so they wouldn't have to get into debt to look after their health, especially in the current constrained financial climate. I'm sure no-one would advocate that.

No one wants to put anyone in the "poor house" while they are attempting to get better. CLEAR treatment is typically covered by insurance.....usually 80% or so in my experience, but unfortunately the scoliosis traction chair is not. I think the best we can do in that case is develop an affordable leasing option. It is tougher to set-up than anyone could imagine. I've been trying for almost 2 years now.

Early stage scoliosis intervention could provide the best outcome for the patient in terms of results and financial responsibility. Hense the logo at the bottom of my post.

I agree, early stage treatment seems to be the way to go!

Regarding the traction chair, does the treatment last for a finite amount of time, so that once one has finished with it the chair could be returned and leased by someone else?

Originally Posted by Goldfinch

Regarding the traction chair, does the treatment last for a finite amount of time, so that once one has finished with it the chair could be returned and leased by someone else?

Wow. Good question. It is going to vary greatly depending on curve size/pattern and adolescent patient vs adult patient. The STC is only really indicated for curves 30 degrees or greater (due to the uncoupled rotation patterns that appear at that stage of curve progression), but it probably needs to be continued until the patient reaches skeletal maturity once the patient has crossed over that 30 degree threshold....regardless if the treatment results in a reduced curvature under 30 degrees.

Adult patients are along a similar route, but have a much less risk of curve progression and loss of treatment gains.

Adolescent patient treatment gains seem to be an "easy come, easy go" scinerio if they aren't compliant with the rehab.....and even when they are compliant in some aggressive cases.....The adult patients seem to be "slow and steady win's the race" and are much slower to achieve treatment gain (but also less likely to lose them).

CLEAR does have a STC buy-back program.....which is actually very generous, but it still doesn't solve the large initial out lay of cash problem. A leasing program is the only idea I can come up with for that issue.

Some very interesting and compelling thoughts Dr. Berry. Taking myself as an example, I find myself pondering some things. Six months ago I had to make the decision to choose surgery, or Spinecor bracing. Surgery would have cost about $300,000 - with me paying 20% after meeting my deductible (far more if I had wanted to choose an out of network surgeon). Factoring in my age and other things, including a review of the published literature - I could have probably expected revision surgery as well down the road, at an age when one would not want to deal with surgery of any kind. The Spinecor treatment (also covered by my insurance with a prescription from my DO), would cost about $5,000.

Quality of life being my priority, I decided to give this new bracing system a shot. Glad I did. After six months, I'm officially out of the needs surgery category both in terms of pain and cobb angle measurements (taken out of brace). Whatever our decisions - we must take a leap of faith & unfortunately all health care is costly and as time goes on .. insurance premiums are on the rise with reduced benefits. And when it comes to scoliosis in the US, few doctors will actually write prescriptions for non surgical methods unless the patient flat out refuses surgery, like I did.

Lots of issues at play with this subject! Cost - should be the least of our concerns, well in a perfect world anyway ;-) I've come across some folks who have thought Spinecor to be expensive. I would have been paying off the cost of surgery for the rest of my life! Maybe on many levels.