School employees protest possible insurance switch : Laura Green
By: Health Insurance
Submitted: 2009-08-16 22:12:56 | Word Count: 635
For seven months, it seemed everything made school secretary Linda Loomis sick. She spent weeks in the hospital with high fevers and pneumonia, only to get sick again as soon as she bounced back.
It took a team of specialists and countless tests to discover that Loomis' body could not fight off infection; she had a rare immune disorder.
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After treatments that would have cost her $3,000 a month without her district-provided health insurance, Loomis is stable.
But she's concerned that a proposed change in school district health care providers could cost her the specialists who finally diagnosed and treated her. Three of the five are not currently in the Blue Cross Blue Shield network.
Loomis is one of more than 150 Palm Beach County School District employees who have protested a possible switch of their health insurance from UnitedHealthcare.
"I don't want to start out with another team," she said told the School Board at a recent meeting.
Superintendent Art Johnson is recommending a switch to a nearly identical plan provided by Blue Cross because, he said, it is the only way to keep costs steady for employees. Employees would have to pay roughly $30 more a month to stay with UnitedHealthcare.
Board member Monroe Benaim, an eye doctor, solidified worries that employees may have to go outside of the network if they want to keep their current doctors.
He tried to join Blue Cross Blue Shield's HMO network when it looked like the district was switching, but was rejected, he said.
The board delayed a vote on the change after complaints that employees had not been given proper notice or an opportunity to ask questions before the deal was approved.
"The Blue Cross plan may be the greatest plan," School Board member Frank Barbieri said. "It's all in the perception. If we want the employees to feel they are part of a team as the district moves forward, [there can't be] edicts coming down from the administration."
Johnson turned the blame on the unions that represent school employees. They were part of the committee tasked with deciding whether to switch firms, he said.
"If there's a failing here, it's not on the district," he said.
The district, which is self-insured, pays 100 percent of employees' health insurance and subsidizes as much as 60 percent for dependents' coverage, depending on the plan.
More than 21,000 employees and about 14,000 dependents are enrolled.
A question and answer sheet covering a range of issues, including doctors and prescription drugs, will go out to employees next week, said Dianne Howard, director of the district's Risk and Benefits Management.
"We do want them to have the information and be comfortable about this," she said. "We understand that medical insurance and medical care is very important to everybody."
Already, Blue Cross has lured 22 of the 87 most used providers, said Howard Gruverman, chief executive officer of Edify LLC, the benefits consulting firm that helped the district choose Blue Cross.
Currently, UnitedHealthcare has about 950 primary care physicians enrolled in Palm Beach County, compared with Blue Cross Blue Shield's 400 to 500, Gruverman said.
The board will vote on the insurance switch in two weeks.
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