Last week Nate had, what will probably be his final appointment, with a speech pathologist from Kaiser. The appointment seemed like a waste of time. The SLP didn't seem familiar with his case, although we had seen her about 2 months ago and the focus was on what I should be doing, instead of any real therapy. At the end of the appointment, I asked her what speech services Kaiser did actually cover in children and the answers were strokes and some cleft palate issues. Kaiser is not focused on treating kids but educating parents. I understand the importance of this, but with CAS, regular, focused sessions are necessary to build muscle memory....more than what can be done day to day at home. So even though he has another appointment with her this week, I'm going to cancel it. I need to pursue getting something in writing from Kaiser explaining why they are denying services and begin exploring other insurance carriers to see if they cover speech at all. I read somewhere that speech services are covered by medical insurance for those who have Federal Government jobs. Randy and I toyed around with that idea.
And other bad news, earlier this week I received a letter from Nate's school going over their First 5 program. They had been receiving funds to support their special needs program (paying for their OT and SLP). Thanks to this money, during the past few years, the school was able to offer speech and OT services free of charge for students 5 and under. Due to the current financial situation, not only locally but statewide, First 5 funding has been cut and the school did not receive the grant. Nate's school is going to continue to provide speech and OT sessions but at a cost to parents. I know that the cost per session is not what would be charged in private therapy, but it's still an additional cost on top of private school tuition. In addition to that, the SLP that Nate has been working with for nearly 2 years is leaving the school to pursue other things. This is really disappointing as well. Initially she was not supportive of my thought that Nate had CAS when I was trying to figure everything out a year ago, but in the past 8 months she's been nothing but supportive, even researching strategies and techniques to help Nate.
I'm now extremely frustrated as not only will there be a new SLP for Nate's sessions with the school district, there will now be someone new at his school and if we pursue the sessions at the University of Redlands, someone new there as well. All I want is regular, consistent therapy. Is that too much to ask?
On a positive note though, the CASANA conference that was held this past month in Philadelphia (would have loved to have gone!) is going to be held in Southern California next July! It's an opportunity to hear the current research on CAS, to meet therapists and other parents who are going through the same things. I can't wait!
