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Transcript for the "Access to Medical Care" video sample
Narrator: People with disabilities, at times, encounter barriers when trying to access medical care. Common obstacles are physical barriers, communication barriers, attitudinal barriers, and social policy barriers.
Alice Wong: Just getting on an exam table for a pelvic exam—it’s very difficult, takes a lot of time and a lot of energy for me. So there’s some things that I admit that I put off or you know just kind of avoid.
Narrator: Ramps, elevators, adjustable exam tables and other accessible equipment enable access to medical care, as well as to optometry, dental and the full range of health services.
Darlene Bubis: Due to my speech impediment, they don’t always realize that I am able to speak for myself. So if I happen to have someone with me, for some reason, they tend to talk to that person rather than to me.
Dale Ritter: So, there’s an easy tendency for people to say, oh, you know, you’re deaf and I don’t need to communicate with you, sort of a mentality from the old days that exists even still today that some hearing people think that deaf people are mutes and even dumb. But we have to remove that stigma.
Laura Oftedahl: There are often generalizations that if you can’t see, then you also can’t make a decision or even sometimes you can’t talk. I’ve actually had people raise their voice when they were communicating with me, and it’s like, I can hear okay, I just can’t see.
Alice Wong: One of the greatest barriers is still the social kind of misconceptions about me and my lifestyle, me and my health really, I think. You know, they don’t realize I have a very active full life where I have a lot of other interests and my health isn’t my main preoccupation.
Darlene Bubis: Doctors think that I am mentally retarded and speak to me as if I am mentally retarded. And I usually have to tell them that I have a Masters degree.
Narrator: Social policy barriers exclude people with disabilities in terms of economic access to health care insurance.
Alice Wong: The main insurance I have is Medicaid, which in California is Medical. And unfortunately many doctors do not take Medical. And there are many procedures and many prescriptions that are not covered by Medical. A lot of durable medical equipment that I need is not covered by Medical.
Reynaldo Cordero, MD: Probably one of the most difficult problems that we have is that in many of the circumstances where we find an overuse of emergency services which are actually much more expensive than primary care services, you find people who are, what we call under-insured.
Narrator: Many providers do not accept patients with Medicaid because reimbursement rates may be low and payment delayed. This can make it more difficult for people with disabilities to find primary care physicians and specialists and the treatment, medication and equipment they need.
Reynaldo Cordero, MD: It puts the physician in the position of having to say no and when they, patients feel that they really need care, they go to the emergency room, because they know that once they walk through the door they will be treated.
Alice Wong: Just getting on an exam table for a pelvic exam—it’s very difficult, takes a lot of time and a lot of energy for me. So there’s some things that I admit that I put off or you know just kind of avoid.
Narrator: Ramps, elevators, adjustable exam tables and other accessible equipment enable access to medical care, as well as to optometry, dental and the full range of health services.
Darlene Bubis: Due to my speech impediment, they don’t always realize that I am able to speak for myself. So if I happen to have someone with me, for some reason, they tend to talk to that person rather than to me.
Dale Ritter: So, there’s an easy tendency for people to say, oh, you know, you’re deaf and I don’t need to communicate with you, sort of a mentality from the old days that exists even still today that some hearing people think that deaf people are mutes and even dumb. But we have to remove that stigma.
Laura Oftedahl: There are often generalizations that if you can’t see, then you also can’t make a decision or even sometimes you can’t talk. I’ve actually had people raise their voice when they were communicating with me, and it’s like, I can hear okay, I just can’t see.
Alice Wong: One of the greatest barriers is still the social kind of misconceptions about me and my lifestyle, me and my health really, I think. You know, they don’t realize I have a very active full life where I have a lot of other interests and my health isn’t my main preoccupation.
Darlene Bubis: Doctors think that I am mentally retarded and speak to me as if I am mentally retarded. And I usually have to tell them that I have a Masters degree.
Narrator: Social policy barriers exclude people with disabilities in terms of economic access to health care insurance.
Alice Wong: The main insurance I have is Medicaid, which in California is Medical. And unfortunately many doctors do not take Medical. And there are many procedures and many prescriptions that are not covered by Medical. A lot of durable medical equipment that I need is not covered by Medical.
Reynaldo Cordero, MD: Probably one of the most difficult problems that we have is that in many of the circumstances where we find an overuse of emergency services which are actually much more expensive than primary care services, you find people who are, what we call under-insured.
Narrator: Many providers do not accept patients with Medicaid because reimbursement rates may be low and payment delayed. This can make it more difficult for people with disabilities to find primary care physicians and specialists and the treatment, medication and equipment they need.
Reynaldo Cordero, MD: It puts the physician in the position of having to say no and when they, patients feel that they really need care, they go to the emergency room, because they know that once they walk through the door they will be treated.