Friday, August 1, 2008

BCBSNC: poor coverage AND NOW THEY SAY THEY'RE IN THE RED : State Auditor Merritt to look at BCBSNC books

July 24, 2008
Les Merritt will examine the State Health Plan
http://pulse.ncpolicywatch.org/?p=1343#comment-18407

Posted at 1:30 PM by Adam Linker

State Auditor Les Merritt says he is going to look into the problems at the State Health Plan to figure out what is behind the $115 million "disparity between the initial forecast and the current projection and will focus on oversight and financial forecasting."

There is still a great deal of confusion about what happened at the SHP that led to lawmakers ousting the former Executive Director George Stokes.

Merritt says there have been "many calls" to the auditor's office asking about the shortfall.

The SHP is overseen by a board of trustees and the legislative committee on employee hospital and medical benefits. ....



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Dr. Hammond's reply to that blog



While not in the domain of 'getting to the bottom of what happened to that money', Mr. Merritt, what happened to our coverage under BCBSNC PPO out in western NC?

Seems that nothing gets noted unless it happens in Raleigh.

Adam Sears has stated that as far as he knows, the state legislators have BCBSNC 'The State Plan.' Are the state legislators from western NC getting access to screening colonoscopies, as covered by BCBSNC, while the citizens and their families with the BCBSNC PPO plans are NOT?

There are NO screening colonoscopies available, which will be paid for by BCBSNC PPO, short of almost 3 hours from Asheville, a major metropolis in western NC.

I therefore assume, as some cynically waxing physicians out here, if BCBSNC isn't just assuming that by the time that colon cancer is diagnosed for some of this, well, heck, we'll be using Medicare and they'll be out of the picture.

For more details see: blogspot:http://madamedefarge2scutinizingbcbsnc.blogspot.com/

Marsha V. Hammond, PhD Clinical / Health Psychologist,
Asheville/ Waynesville, NC