Editorial: Doctors get stiffed by health insurers

Larry Matheis, executive director of the Nevada State Medical Association, told the Assembly Commerce and Labor Committee last week that some doctors have had to wait up to nine months before they get paid. Carson City orthopedic surgeon Dr. Joseph Walls said he had to spend $30,000 for a billing service to go after insurance companies to get reimbursed.

In an effort to ensure prompt payments by health insurers, Senate Bill 145 in the Nevada Legislature would require insurers to approve or deny a claim in 30 days; once a claim is approved, insurers would then have 30 days to pay. The advent of managed care was supposed to not only provide better and more uniform care of patients, it also was going to provide quick payments for physicians who were in the insurer's network. If that payment link between insurers and physicians breaks down patients ultimately will suffer, because doctors likely will stop seeing patients from a chronically late insurer.

Patients, and now physicians, increasingly are at the mercy of powerful insurers, so the Legislature should make sure that all the links in the health care chain are operating reasonably. The Legislature should pass SB145.

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