Scheduling appointments directly with a physical therapist rather than going through a physician can be less expensive, according to U.S. researchers.
UPI reports the Public Health Studies Center with the University of Iowa probed five-years-worth of private health insurance claims, which totaled roughly 63,000 outpatient physical therapy claims for patients aged 18 to 64 in Iowa and South Dakota. The study was published in the journal Health Services Research.
"Our findings do not support the assertion that self-referral leads to overuse of care or discontinuity in care, based on a very large population of individuals in a common private health insurance plan with no requirement for physical therapy referral or prohibition on patient self-referral," according to a statement from study authors.
At least 17,000 referrals during the time period from 2003 through 2007 were considered "self-referral" and these patients had less visits with physical therapists. So too was there a lower amount allowed for care following adjustments for age, gender, diagnosis, the severity of the illness and the calendar year.
Treating the concern for which the patient had physical therapy was lower for the group considered self referred.