How about rehabilitation quotas for patients who suffer an anoxic brain injury??? Don't think they exist? Think again.
I had it from a good authority, a representative of a large hospital who advertises as a brain rehabilitation center, that these quotas not only exist, but that they are actively working in Congress to get that quota reduced from 35% of their brain injury load to...whatever percentage they can get. She admitted to me that ideally, they don't want to take care of patients with anoxic brain injury AT ALL. She said they were too expensive and too time consuming. I told her I would meet them in DC. I guess she thought I was just an overtired, frumpy mom so what could I do or say when she revealed this information to me. She was wrong. My only child died 35 days later of a sudden cardiac arrest. I have nothing left to do BUT go to DC and become the old lady in the halls.
After discussing this 35% quota with a brain injury case manager a few days after meeting with this hospital representative, I learned that this quota is an inside secret. He said, "I am sure this is an inside secret the hospitals didn't want anyone to know."
What this translates to is a reduction in available beds for any patient who suffers a brain injury for anything else but TBI (traumatic brain injury). If these hospitals get their way, patients with an anoxic/hypoxic brain injury will be shuffled off faster to an ill-equipped nursing home than you can say "Snow White".
The government knows the problems exist. TWENTY YEARS AGO, the FBI investigated a large corporate brain rehabilitation chain. According to research from the Church of Scientology, part of the investigation included quotas. I have no connection to their church but did feel that this article has merit in reading.
I found the quota mentioned on their site, then searched for more news. One paragraph stood out.
New Medico, covered in a congressional report entitled
"Fraud and Abuse in the Head Injury Rehabilitation Industry,"
included, "inappropriate care, fraudulent billings, misleading marketing
practices and the use of non-skilled workers." Other allegations included
"unethical recruitment of patients, virtually non-existent medical
treatment, falsifying treatment records to show improvement to families,
referral fees paid to hospital personnel and patient quota."
Other links I have found so far.
Treating of Severe Brain Injuries Is Profitable, but Not
for PatientsBy PETER KERR
Published: March 16, 1992
Published: March 16, 1992
COMPANY NEWS; F.B.I. Seizes Records of New MedicoBy PETER KERR
Published: October 28, 1992
Published: October 28, 1992
New Medico sells its last 3 facilitiesBy John H. Kennedy
Published: August 9, 1993
Published: August 9, 1993
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