{"id":81190,"date":"2025-08-20T22:49:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T22:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/81190\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T22:49:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T22:49:08","slug":"her-spine-surgery-was-denied-doctors-say-its-all-too-common","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/81190\/","title":{"rendered":"Her spine surgery was denied. Doctors say it’s all too common."},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of gray zone decision-making in spine surgery,\u201d DiGiorgio said. \u201cYou could show a patient presentation, an MRI, to five spine surgeons and get 10 different answers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dr. Randall Dryer, an orthopedic surgeon at Central Texas Spine Institute who treated White but did not perform her surgery, said doctors often have to make a convincing case to insurance companies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe insurance companies refuse to accept the fact that surgery for degenerative disease is effective. They will say it\u2019s because the medical literature doesn\u2019t support it, but they take cherry-picked articles that support their case, and they tend to downplay other literature that would indicate that surgical treatment is effective,\u201d Dryer said.<\/p>\n

An Aetna spokesperson pointed NBC News to two<\/a> published analyses<\/a> that found no clear benefits from spine surgery over a nonsurgical intervention. But other studies have shown that spine surgery is superior to nonsurgical treatments<\/a>, such as physical therapy or injections, and reduces a patient\u2019s disability<\/a>.<\/p>\n

White\u2019s father, Wrath James White, is the policyholder for her insurance plan. He said he was shocked to receive a letter from Aetna saying their request for coverage had been denied.<\/p>\n

\"AWhite views a video her father, Wrath James White, posted to social media about her struggle to secure insurance coverage from Aetna for her spinal surgery.Harmon Li for NBC News<\/p>\n

\u201cI had never had insurance reject a legitimate claim before, and my daughter\u2019s pain seemed about as legitimate as you can get,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

When his daughter was diagnosed, the family tried less invasive approaches than surgery such as physical therapy, steroid injections and anti-inflammatory pills. But it became clear to them \u2014 and to White\u2019s doctors \u2014 that spine surgery was the only option to alleviate her pain. <\/p>\n

\u201cI did everything I possibly could for four years to avoid doing surgery on her,\u201d Dryer said. He noted in a 2022 report that White was \u201cmiserable\u201d and \u201cI could significantly improve the patient\u2019s condition with a simple decompression and discectomy,\u201d referring to surgical procedures to remove compression on her nerves.<\/p>\n

If you are dealing with bills that seem to be out of line or a denial of coverage, care or repairs, whether for health, home or auto, please email us at Costofdenial@nbcuni.com.<\/a><\/p>\n

A report from White\u2019s surgeon in April said she had \u201cfailed multiple rounds of physical therapy and pain management and as such I feel she has reached a point for surgical intervention.\u201d <\/p>\n

White\u2019s parents ultimately decided to set up a GoFundMe to raise money for the surgery. In a matter of days, they received more than $33,000 in donations \u2014 close to the amount they were quoted for White\u2019s surgery, including hospital fees, anesthesiology and doctor\u2019s fees.<\/p>\n

Wrath James White said he believes a lot of those donations were \u201csmall and silent protests.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of gray zone decision-making in spine surgery,\u201d DiGiorgio said. \u201cYou could show a patient presentation,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81191,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102,2960,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-81190","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-healthcare","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}