An Open Letter Regarding My Thoughts on the Current Situation
By Richard McLoy
Welch & McLoy Therapy Services
New Port Richey, FL
“The broadest and most prevalent error requires the most disinterested virtue to sustain.”
Henry David Thoreau “On Civil Disobedience”
A number of years ago, our small community of clinics was faced with a major challenge – Prepaid Therapy. A small group of therapists saw this program as a major threat to the community and the services that we provide to children. We worked hard and diligently. As a result, the Prepaid Therapy program was shown to be full of problems. The State was forced to rethink the program and eventually decided not to continue with implementation.
We are, again, faced with a major challenge to our community. The State has decided to privatize the Medicaid program (euphemistically called: Managed Medical Assistance Program). While many of the children we serve may be exempt from joining the MMA program, we still have a large number that will be placed into a MMAP. The selection of MMAP providers leaves us faced with joining one of the groups we helped to stop during the Prepaid Therapy problem.
TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same
Robert Frost “The Road Not Taken”
I am now faced with the same dilemma I was faced with when Prepaid Therapy was coming. Should I sign a contract with which I do not agree or try to continue without being part of that group? The road I have picked is the second. I will continue with those MMAP’s that do not include a Prepaid Therapy provider and encourage others to try that path, as well.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Robert Frost “The Road Not Taken”