“A doctor has shared a shocking story of how UnitedHealthcare stopped a cancer surgery to ask if it was medically necessary in a new Instagram video,” Suzanne Blake writes over at Newsweek. “Elisabeth Potter, a doctor based in Austin, Texas, created a video on Instagram detailing her experience treating a cancer patient and the roadblocks UnitedHealthcare put up during a surgery procedure. UnitedHealthcare’s CEO Brian Thompson was shot and killed in Manhattan in early December, sparking a wave of debate and criticism over how insurance companies like UnitedHealthcare block care for patients under prior authorization rules. … Potter said she was performing a bilateral DIEP flap surgery, which is a reconstruction surgery that takes place after a mastectomy, when she was interrupted by a call from United Healthcare. The patient was already asleep on the operating table. ‘They demanded information about her diagnosis and inpatient stay justification,’ Potter said in a post on Instagram. ‘I had to scrub out mid-surgery to call United, only to find that the person on the line didn’t even have access to the patient’s full medical information, despite the procedure already being pre-approved. It’s beyond frustrating and, frankly, unacceptable. Patients and providers deserve better than this. We should be focused on care, not bureaucracy.’ ” Suzanne Blake, “Doctor says UnitedHealthcare stopped cancer surgery to ask if necessary,” Newsweek.
