“There is a lot of decision -making in the gray area in column surgery,” said Digiorgio. “It can show a presentation of the patient, a magnetic resonance, five column surgeons and obtain 10 different responses.”
Dr. Randall Dryer, an orthopedic surgeon at the Institute of the Texas Spine center that treated White but did not do their surgery, said doctors often have to present a convincing case for insurance companies.
“Insurance companies refuse to accept the fact that surgery for degenerative disease is effective. They will say that it is because medical literature does not support it, but they take selected items that support their case, and tend to minimize another literature that indicates that surgical treatment is effective,” Dryer said.
An AETNA spokesman said NBC News to two published analyzes that did not find clear benefits of spine surgery during a non -surgical intervention. But other studies have shown that column surgery is superior to non -surgical treatments, such as physiotherapy or injections, and reduces the disability of a patient.
White’s father, Wrath James White, is the insured of his insurance plan. He said he was surprised to receive a letter from Aetna saying that his coverage application had been denied.
“I had never made insurance before rejecting a legitimate claim, and my daughter’s pain seemed as legitimate as possible,” he said.
When her daughter was diagnosed, the family tried less invasive approaches than surgery, such as physiotherapy, steroid injections and anti -inflammatory pills. But it became clear to them, and for White doctors, that column surgery was the only option to relieve their pain.
“I did everything I could for four years to avoid surgery,” Dryer said. He pointed out in a 2022 report that White was “miserable” and “could significantly improve the patient’s condition with a simple decompression and disccetomy”, referring to surgical procedures to eliminate the compression of his nerves.
If these are invoices that seem to be out of line or a denial of coverage, care or repairs, either for health, home or car, send us an email to Costofdenial@nbcuni.com.
A White surgeon report in April said that “there had been multiple rounds of physiotherapy and pain management and, as such, I think it has reached a point for surgical intervention.”
White’s parents finally decided to establish a gofundme to raise money for surgery. In a matter of days, they received more than $ 33,000 in donations, near the amount that were cited for White surgery, including hospital rates, anesthesiology and doctor’s fees.
Wrath James White said he believes that many of those donations were “small and silent protests.”
