Influx expected with funding for ACC sexual abuse service set to double

An article from NZ Doctor by Ruth Brown

ACC is braced for an influx of new sex abuse claimants following the launch of its more generous service for sensitive claims. The budget for this financial year is $14.6 million, to cover support assessment and treatment. This is set to almost double to $29.5 million for the 2015/16 year. In the 2013/14 year ACC spent $12.5 million on sensitive claims.
A year-on-year 10 per cent increase is conservatively estimated, says Emma Powell, strategy manager, sexual violence at ACC. Since the service began rolling out last November, an extra 1000 claims have been lodged for the service which, at any one time, is dealing with 5500–6000 claims. The main difference is the service is now fully funded so clients won’t be asked to make a copayment which previously was sometimes as high as $90 for counselling sessions, Ms Powell told New Zealand Doctor.
The Integrated Services for Sensitive Claims (ISSC) was officially launched in Wellington last night.

‘Less daunting’ assessment
Ms Powell says the assessment process for claimants has changed significantly after feedback from clients that it was “pretty daunting”. Instead of assessments being conducted by an independent party over one or two sessions, ACC now offers supported assessments which have been allocated up to 26 hours. This is allocated for support sessions interwoven with assessment sessions and a de-brief with the claimant at the end. Also, counsellors who may have conducted the original sessions are likely to be involved with the supported assessments, she says.

Not enough counsellors
Ms Powell acknowledges a lack of trained counsellors in some parts of the country.
In a previous New Zealand Doctor story, Wellington GP and deputy chair of Doctors for Sexual Abuse Care GP Cathy Stephenson said sexual abuse survivors were still facing barriers because of too few counsellors.
Ms Powell says areas such as South Canterbury, the West Coast and remote rural areas were most affected by a lack of counsellors specialising in sexual abuse. But ACC will pay for providers to travel to these areas.
“We will be working through some of those gaps fairly smartly,” she says.
ACC currently has 175 suppliers with 770 providers on its books and it’s currently assessing and processing another 110 potential providers, she says.

© 2015 MIMS (NZ) Ltd

http://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/news/2015/march-2015/03/influx-expected-with-funding-for-acc-sexual-abuse-service-set-to-double.aspx

Abuse claim oversight switch stuns providers

An article from the New Zealand Herald by Simon Collins

Australian health insurer Medibank has won a bid to manage sexual abuse claims for the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC).
The company, which is being sold by the Abbott Government in a share float expected to fetch up to A$5.5 billion ($6.1 billion), is one of 173 successful bidders to become "suppliers" of sexual abuse counselling - a new management layer that will contract with counsellors and psychologists who will remain the service "providers". Other successful bidders include Active Physiotherapy, now called Active+, and Auckland's biggest doctors' network, Procare.
Counselling leaders are alarmed. Manukau counsellor Tania Blomfield, who co-chairs the national network of sex abuse counselling agencies, said she was concerned that "private sensitive information is going into databases outside of the sector".
"It scares me that they may be seeing this as a potential money-spinner," she said.
ACC has lifted funding from a standard $83 an hour at present to new rates which will stay about the same for counsellors with diplomas but will increase to about $100 an hour for those with master's degrees or $130 an hour for physiotherapists, or more for clinical psychologists. But counsellors who go into the new integrated contracts will no longer be able to charge clients "top-up" fees of up to $90, and some could end up worse off if the supplier companies managing the contracts take a big cut for administration.
"From the client's perspective, which is what it's all about, this is going to be a lot better than the existing system, but the question is going to be how badly do the providers get screwed along the way," Ms Blomfield said.
Medibank NZ general manager Andrea Pettett said the company approached about 700 of the 900 ACC-registered counsellors and received indications of interest from more than 100 of them. The company also operates the Healthline phone service for the Ministry of Health and is believed to be on a shortlist of three, along with Lifeline and a company owned by Procare and Christchurch doctors' network Pegasus, in another tender to integrate Healthline with other helpline services.

Sex abuse tender

Why are sex-abuse counselling contracts being re-tendered?
ACC's new "integrated contracts" include assessing clients' needs as well as providing counselling. Until now most counsellors have not had contracts but simply billed ACC for hours worked.

Why can insurance companies and physiotherapists bid?
ACC has opened up the criteria for assessments to allow clients to choose their assessors and counsellors. Until now ACC decided who did the assessments.

What will change for sexual abuse survivors?
They should get a more integrated service, fully funded by ACC. Counsellors in integrated contracts can no longer charge clients extra fees above the ACC subsidy.

Why are counsellors worried?
Some counsellors worry that insurance and physiotherapy companies won't understand privacy issues and other sensitivities in sexual abuse cases.

© 2014 APN New Zealand Ltd

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11346777

ACC specialists fees reveal huge doubts about independence

A press release from the Green Party by Kevin Hague

Evidence that ACC is paying some medical specialists up to half a million dollars a year, an average of up to $1666 each client, reveals huge doubts about the independence of some of the corporation’s favourite doctors, the Green Party said today.
“I have documents showing ACC paid some of its top specialists up to $500,000 a year for between 300 and 500 clients,” Green Party ACC spokesperson Kevin Hague said.
“The enormous volume of work and the huge fees paid to these specialists suggest they have been well and truly wrapped up in ACC’s processes for delivering its goal to ‘target the low hanging fruit’ – the people with long term injuries.
“It would be totally unacceptable if the corporation was using doctors it can rely on to deliver assessments that meet that target.
“ACC has a well-established and clear goal of exiting people from the scheme and it is crucial that medical assessments are seen to be truly independent.
“It seems little has changed since Judge Trapski’s damning 1994 report that found, in the case of one favoured ACC specialist, that he’d been used over the years as ACC’s “hit man.”
“Trapski warned then that ACC’s medical assessors need to not only function as independent specialists but must be seen to be independent.
“Favouring a select group of specialists whose medical opinions appear to favour ACC’s agenda is not being seen to be independent.
“The huge fees paid to these assessors, combined with the extremely high rate that ACC’s decisions on long term claimants are overturned at review, reveals real concerns about the fairness of their decisions.
“The ACC Minister must urgently enquire into the appointment of these specialists, and instruct her new board to devise a way to appoint truly independent assessors.
“In answer to my questions in the House today the Minister seems to share our concerns and be determined to actually achieve independent assessments.
“An option would be to bulk fund DHBs to provide a rolling roster of specialists to provide ACC assessments in their region, or contract with professional colleges to ensure the assessments are independent,” Mr Hague said.
Data received through OIA on the payments made and workloads of ACC assessors: http://www.greens.org.nz/misc-documents/data-received-through-oia-payments-made-and-workloads-acc-assessors

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1209/S00211/acc-specialists-fees-reveal-huge-doubts-about-independence.htm