Summit Vision Center

Dr. Langford August 13th, 2006

Summit Vision Center accepts many insurances. If you don’t see yours on the list, then please call 435-563-2020.

Vision Plans:
VSP (Vision Service Plan)
EyeMed
OptumHealth Vision (formerly called Spectera)
UnitedHealthcare Vision (formerly called Spectera)

Major Insurance Carriers:
Altius
BlueCross BlueShield (Traditional and ValueCare)
Regence MedAdvantage
Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators (DMBA)
Educators Mutual
United Health Care (UHC)
Public Employees Health Program (PEHP) (but not Exclusive plan)
Government Employees Hospital Association (GEHA)
Medicare (age 65 and over)
Medicaid and PCN
CHIP (but only if PEHP open access- NOT PEHP exclusive and not Molina.)
Coventry Health Care (First Health and National networks)

PPO Networks
Beech Street
PHCS
PPO*USA

Employer Plans
Campbell Scientific, Inc. (CSI)
EA Miller typically uses VSP (see above)
Employers using Smith Administrators to handle healthcare
(Basically any that will allow an optometrist office to bill them)

Many insurances will let you see any doctor (like Campbell Scientific). Some insurance plans provide an “out-of-network” benefit to allow you to be partially reimbursed, so check your plan.

A word about IHC, now called SelectHealth. If you do a search on the IHC website for optometry providers allowed to bill IHC, then you will find a short list. All of them are outside the Provo-Salt Lake City-Ogden-Logan corridor and in rural areas. (An unusual exception is Brigham City and St. George.)

Of course when I opened my practice, I wanted to be allowed to see IHC beneficiaries. I sent a letter of intent with my credentials to Vickie Szemerey, an Intermountain Healthcare Ancillary Provider Representative. I was hoping Smithfield was considered rural enough, or whatever the requirement is, to allow me, an optometrist, to bill IHC.

They sent me a voice mail back saying that “The panel is limited in that area, and we are not accepting new provider applications at this time. I will keep your letter of request and interest on file so that if there should be a need in that area and we open a panel in the future, I can be sure to get back in touch with you.”

If that is the truth, why would they limit the panel in our area? It can’t be that there isn’t enough demand or need. The ophthalmologists in our area are booked up. The last time I phone shopped (around May 2006), the soonest I could get in for a routine eye exam was one week, the latest was 3 months:
Dr. Siler 10 weeks
Dr. Waterman 5 weeks
Dr. Raymond 3 weeks
Dr Jaussi 1 week
Dr Young- not accepting new patients

I can get you in the same day. The new SelectHealth commercials on TV advertise quick access to care. Waiting over a week to get a routine eye exam when your glasses break is not quick access to care. Having to fight traffic in Logan to be seen for a red eye problem is a hardship. You could just as well see your hometown eye doctor in Smithfield-except your insurance won’t allow/pay for it right now.

I would urge all people with SelectHealth/IHC insurance in Smithfield and north Cache Valley to please contact IHC and ask them to open the eyecare panel in Cache County. A good place to start might be Vickie Szemerey at 1-801-442-5673. You deserve to see any willing provider. It’s no skin off their nose, because they would compensate me the same, if not less, than an ophthalmologist. We must break down what I assume is politics in the IHC administration to allow for quicker, more convenient, access to patient care.

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