NRMA
Dumps Hypnotherapists
HypnosisAustralia,
May 2007
By
Dr Tracie O'Keefe DCH, Clinical Hypnotherapist, Psychotherapist &
Counsellor
Editorial Director of HypnosisAustralia Online.
The Journal
recently became aware that the NRMA private health fund had dumped refunds
for clients from hypnotherapists without telling the hypnotherapists themselves.
This apparently happened a few years ago but the NRMA failed to notify
hypnotherapists.
People who
hold top-level old NRMA policies can still claim refunds from visits to
hypnotherapists who are registered with NRMA but new policies taken out
with NRMA will no longer cover hypnotherapy unless it is administered
by a psychologist or medical doctor.
The irony
of this move is that the psychologists and doctors who qualify for private
health fund refunds rebates have often been trained in hypnotherapy by
many of the very extensively qualified hypnotherapists whose clients can
no longer get rebated on new NRMA polices.
The Journal
is aware that some GPs and psychologists are advertising and practising
hypnotherapy with less than 50 hours training, no supervision and getting
their clients to claim healthfund rebates. Many hypnotherapists, however,
who have thousands of hours of training in hypnotherapy are unable to
get health fund rebates for their clients.
Insurance
companies are notorious for trying to dodge ways to get out of paying
claims. They advertise themselves as family friendly and open to what
they call "alternative medicines" but in reality those advertising
claims are often inducers to get people to buy their policies. In reality
companies like the NRMA are failing miserably to appreciate that many
hypnotherapists in Australia are highly trained professionals who belong
to self-regulated professional associations that often operate to high
standards. They are lazy and exclusionary when approached by professional
hypnotherapy associations to recognise their members as genuine health
professionals.
Inevitably
people taking out new healthfund policies with the NRMA will often have
to settle for second best care because they will be unable to claim rebates
from services provided by many professional clinical hypnotherapists.
The NRMA's new polices and policies of many other insurance companies
are short-sighted and are not considering the best interests of those
policy holders.
©HypnosisAustralia,
May 2007
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