PAYMENT OPTIONS
Payment is due at the time of service. Our office accepts cash, checks, Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover. In order to schedule an appointment, you will be required to have a credit card on file. Charges will be applied to your credit card if you miss or cancel an appointment without proper notice. Follow-up or virtual consultations will be due on the day of your appointment and will be billed to your credit card on file in our office unless you provide other payment information and instructions prior to your appointment. Laboratory testing that does not need to be paid directly to the lab by you will be itemized and reviewed prior to charging your card.
You are responsible for outside fees for functional laboratory testing that is separate and not billed at the time of the appointment. If additional lab tests are required and our office sends test kits, the appropriate fees will be discussed with you and your payment will be made directly to that lab. If you have questions about billing for these labs, you are responsible for contacting the lab and insurance company directly prior to sending these tests.
** Please note that we are not Medicare providers and are opted out of the Medicare program. Our services cannot be submitted to Medicare for reimbursement.
We also accept payment from Health Savings Accounts (HSA) or Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA). If you have an HSA (Health Savings Account), functional medicine consultations and prescribed supplements are allowable, tax-free expenditures. Health Savings Accounts are a new option for health insurance and they have two parts. The first part is a health insurance policy that covers large hospital bills. The second part of the Health Savings Account is an investment account or retirement account from which you can withdraw money tax-free for medical care. Unused money accumulates with tax-free interest until retirement, when you can withdraw for any purpose and pay normal income taxes.
We strongly urge you to look into an HSA as an alternative insurance choice. To find out more, please go to www.hsainsider.com.
We recommend that everyone ask their insurance providers what type of out-of-network coverage they offer prior to using our services.
INSURANCE EXPECTATIONS
Indigo Integrative Health Clinic does not accept insurance, including Medicare. You will be provided with diagnosis and procedure codes, which can be submitted to your insurance company, except for Medicare, for reimbursement if you have insurance that provides out-of-network benefits. If you are unsure, call the member services number on the back of your card and inquire about your plan. You can let them know you are planning an appointment with an out-of-network practitioner and want to know what percentage of your visit will be eligible for reimbursement based on the allowed amount. Common codes used for appointments include 99205, 99215 and 99354. Indigo Health Clinic cannot guarantee insurance reimbursement for any services and will not be responsible for any discrepancies between the information from the insurance company and what you receive as reimbursement.
SALE OF NUTRACEUTICAL AND HERBAL SUPPLEMENTS
According to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, as amended, Section 201(g)(1), the term drug is defined as an “article intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease.” Technically, vitamins, minerals, trace elements, amino acids, herbs, or homeopathic remedies are not classified as drugs. However, these substances can have significant effects on physiology and must be used rationally. In this office, we provide nutritional counseling and make individualized recommendations regarding use of these substances in order to upgrade the quality of foods in a patient’s diet and to supply nutrition to support the physiological and biomechanical processes of the human body. Although these products may also be suggested with a specific therapeutic purpose in mind, their use is chiefly designed to support given aspects of metabolic function. Use of nutritional supplements may be safely recommended for patients already using pharmaceutical medications (drugs), but some potentially harmful interactions may occur. For this reason, it is important to keep all of your healthcare providers fully informed about all medications and nutritional supplements, herbs, or hormones you may be taking.
Your practitioner at Indigo Integrative Health Clinic may include the recommendation of dietary supplementation as part of your treatment plan. The quality of supplements found in the general market varies widely due to a lack of stringent testing requirements. As a service to you, we make available high quality pharmaceutical grade nutraceuticals, through our line Indigo Formulations and other high grade, high quality nutraceutical supplement companies in our clinic. We purchase these products only from manufacturers who have gained our confidence through considerable research and experience.
We determine quality by considering: (1) the quality of science behind the product; (2) the quality of the ingredients themselves; (3) the quality of the manufacturing process; and (4) the synergism among product components. The supplements that we carry in our facility are those that meet our high standards and tend to produce predictable results.
You are under no obligation to purchase nutraceutical supplements at our clinic and the quality of the health care services you are offered will not be affected if you choose to either purchase similar products elsewhere or not to follow the recommendations that you take certain supplements.
While these supplements may come at a higher financial cost than those found on the shelves of pharmacies or health food stores, the value must also include assurance of their purity, quality, bioavailability (ability to be properly absorbed and utilized by the body), and effectiveness. The chief reason we make these products available is to ensure quality. You are not guaranteed the same level of quality when you purchase your supplements from the general marketplace. We are not suggesting that such products have no value; however, given the lack of stringent testing requirements for dietary supplements, product quality varies widely.