Medication Policy can be found here.
Payment Policy information can be found below.

Services
Dr. Anne is board certified in Family Practice and can diagnose and manage 90% of medical conditions without need for a referral. Providing "one stop shopping" for patients is a growing trend in healthcare and patients have indicated a strong preference for physicians who understand this concept. She treats hypertension, diabetes, arthritis, hyperlipidemia (high cholesterol and triglycerides), gastrointestinal problems, tendonitis, skin conditions including acne and dermatitis, urinary tract problems and acute illness such as coughs, colds and sore throats. She can remove skin tags, warts and moles although she prefers to refer to a specialist if the lesion is on the face. There are many services offered at Valley Health Care, if you are not sure, please feel free to ask a nurse. Dr. White sees patients, both male and female ages twelve and up.

Appointments
To schedule or change an appointment, please call us at (706) 295-5150. All appointments must be rescheduled at least one (1) business day before appointment. Please see our missed appointment policy for further clarification.

Sick Visits
We understand that situations come up from time to time such as sore throats, infections and sprains. We keep a few time slots open for “work-ins” every day. We know that it is important that you be seen quickly so you can return to your daily life. We will make every effort to see you the same day. However, in the event that you cannot be seen the same day, we guarantee that you will be seen the next day.

We ask that you call ahead for same day “work-in” appointments to avoid “walk-ins” in which a patient walks in off the street to be seen. This puts the schedule behind and makes other patients wait who already have an appointment. Please observe this policy.

Let Us Know Up Front
During your exam, our providers will give her entire attention to you and your situation. However, different situations take different amounts of time. We ask that you be upfront with all complaints when scheduling appointments. Our office schedules the amount of time a healthcare provider will spend with you based upon the symptoms that you are exhibiting. The providers will only be able to see you for the complaints for which you have been scheduled. If you have additional complications that arise during conversation with the provider, you will be asked to make another appointment. In many cases, this is also being done to prevent you from having to make a payment out of pocket. Unfortunately, insurance companies often will not pay for multiple complaints in one visit, making you responsible for the bill. Your time is important to us and to you; this policy helps to keep your wait time to a minimum.

Missed Appointments
You are expected to keep your appointments with providers. An empty appointment slot means a lost opportunity for another individual to have his/her healthcare needs addressed. We require notification of an appointment cancellation at least twenty-four (24) business hours prior to the scheduled appointment. Thus the inability to make it to a Monday appointment would require notification by Friday, preferably by Thursday. We make a notation in your chart regarding the first broken appointment. Any exceptions to the 24- hour rule will be determined on a case-by-case basis. With the exception of unforeseeable situations, if you miss an appointment, a notation will be made in your chart.

We make ever effort to remind you of your appointment times. Sleeping through the appointment, forgetting it or getting confused about the date of your appointment is not acceptable. As a courtesy to you, we call you two days before the appointment to confirm your appointment. Because missed appointments are penalized, you are strongly encouraged to call and explain the situation if something unforeseen arises and causes you to miss an appointment.

After the second broken appointment, you will be required to keep a credit card on file. You will be charge a fee of $45.00 for all broken appointments after two missed appointments. Your insurance will not cover this fee, so you will be expected to honor this requirement. This fee is designed to help keep the overall cost of healthcare down. Our protocol is to dismiss a patient after four missed appointments and we sincerely hope that this never becomes necessary.

We remain an independent physicians practice so that we can give you the individual attention that you deserve. We value our patients and try to keep the overall cost of healthcare down. We ask that you keep scheduled appointments in order to help us accomplish this goal and be able to continue to deliver quality healthcare to you for many years to come.

*We are open two Saturdays a month from 8:00 AM until 12:00 PM.
Please call ahead for you appointment today.

**Our office phones go to an answering machine between 11:30 AM and 12:30
PM for lunch. If you call, we will respond to your message as soon as possible.
Valley Health Care Observes the following holidays: (Office will be closed)

New Years Day
Good Friday
Forth of July
Thanksgiving and the day after
Christmas Eve
Christmas Day
MLK Holiday
Memorial Day
Labor Day

Insurance Plans Accepted at Valley Health Care:

Insurance Plans We Do not Accept:
Amerigroup
Georgia Better Health Care
Medicaid – not with new patients
Peachcare
Tricare Prime “Champus”
Wellcare
Consent Forms

When you sign in as a new patient and fill out your patient registration form, you sign a general consent form on the reverse side. This gives several consents and it is important for you to understand in plain English to what you are consenting.

Consent for treatment: Just what it says – you give permission for Dr. Anne to examine your body, perform lab tests, diagnostic testing and treat you with medications. Of course, Dr. Anne is required to explain all this to you as things come up.

Assignment of Insurance Benefits and Authorization for Release of Medical Records: You agree to let the office bill your insurance company and for the insurance company to pay the office directly. It also means that you AGREE to pay any charges not covered by your insurance company. You also agree to allow the office to release your medical records to your insurance company, your pharmacist, any physician to whom Dr. Anne refers you, and Worker’s Compensation carriers. This includes information and records related to psychiatric treatment, drug and alcohol treatment, or HIV/AIDS treatment.

Personal Responsibility for Payment of Charges: You agree to pay charges not covered by your medical plan unless your plan limits your liability. For example, some insurance plans don’t cover routine labs. Well, you may not know what your cholesterol is and Dr. Anne may recommend a routine cholesterol check. If your insurance company won’t cover this test, you will need to be prepared to pay for it. Unfortunately, there are times when neither our office nor you will know for sure whether the insurance company will cover a particular lab. Sometimes, it just has to be filed to see whether it will be covered. Never be shy about asking about the cost of labs, etc. The staff will be happy to answer your questions.

Notification of Lab Results
You will either be notified by mail, phone or asked to schedule a recheck in order to review your lab results. Keep in mind that one of the missions of Valley Health Care is patient education. This means that our providers will take the time to educate you on what the results of your lab mean to you. They will also educate you on the steps that you can take to correct lab results that are outside of normal ranges. At the time of having laboratory procedures performed, be sure to ask how you will receive the results.
You will be notified by mail or telephone about all lab tests, pap smears, mammograms and other studies that are ordered by Dr. Anne. We send letters about routine and normal results and call about more complicated or abnormal reports. If you do not hear from the office about such items within 3 weeks of it being performed, it is your responsibility to contact the office about the status of the test results. .
PLEASE do NOT call the office for results just a few days after the test was performed; remember to give us the 3 week lead time. It takes time to process the many test reports that come into the office on a daily basis. Dr. Anne has to personally review, sign and make recommendations on every single report coming in. This is very time consuming and she works hard at being thorough in her evaluations.

Medications

Refills
Our policy is for the patient to call their pharmacy and ask them to fax the request for your medication to (706) 295-4865 Attn: Medication Refills. Requests are usually handled with 48-72 business hours. Processing times may vary depending on the availability of the doctor, who for your safety must review each request prior to completion.

Prescriptions for Sudden Illness
We recognize that sometimes you will need to call us regarding medication requests such as an acute illness requiring nausea or decongestant medication. In these cases, every effort will be made to have the prescription filled the same day. The sooner in the day that these requests go in, the more likely they can be filled the same day. Many illnesses require an office visit to determine proper course of treatment. If you are unsure, please call one our nurses.

Patients on Narcotics
Patients taking narcotics or other potentially addictive drugs are expected to keep up with when their refills are due. Dr. Anne expects to see them on at least a quarterly basis to monitor their medical reasons for such drugs. Narcotics will NOT be phoned in outside of weekday office hours. Narcotics will NEVER be phoned in on the weekend. Don’t even ask. Patients who require chronic narcotics will be asked to sign a narcotic contract in which guidelines for narcotic use are clearly outlined. Narcotics are not kept in this office!

Drug Samples
We are happy to help out our patients with samples as we have them available. Please be sure to ask the nurse or Dr. Anne for samples when you are in for a visit. Also please note that if you are on birth control pills and must pay out of pocket for your pills, we are more than happy to help out with your pills.

We are sometimes asked to help patients out with pharmacy assistance programs in which the pharmaceutical companies provide medications free of charge to patients with no insurance coverage for medications.

After Hours Coverage
Dr. Anne takes call Monday through Thursday nights after regular office hours. All you have to do is call the main office number and you will be instructed on what to do. Dr. Anne only takes urgent calls after hours. Requests for prescription refills and appointments are not considered to be urgent. Dr. Anne no longer uses an answering service and is now taking her own call on her cell phone. On weekends, she switches off with 3 other physicians and we leave a message on our answering machine as to which physician is on call and what number to call to contact them. Please do not call Dr. Anne if she is NOT on call.

Dr. Anne shares weekend call with three other physicians so she usually covers every fourth weekend. That means either Dr. Anne or one of her colleagues covers Friday through Sunday night call. She shares call with the following physicians: Dr. James Collins; Dr. Brenda Budlong; Dr. Joseph Biuso. They only cover on weekends taking turns with Dr. Anne.

If you are having chest pain or stroke like symptoms go straight to the emergency room. Don’t even bother to call Dr. Anne! There are exciting new drugs for both these conditions that can stop any damage from occurring but they must be administered with 2 hours of onset of symptoms. It is IMPERATIVE that patients with possible stroke, mini-stroke or heart attack get to the emergency room as quickly as possible.

Dr. Anne needs “down time” just like everyone else and taking time off allows her to maintain her own emotional health. Dr. Anne usually takes call even when she is “off”. As a rule, Dr. Anne takes the week of Spring Break for Rome City Schools off and takes a week off in the summer. Any other off days are usually combined into a long weekend.

Hospitalization
Dr. Anne restricts her practice to outpatient medicine; in other words, office visits. If you require hospitalization, Dr. Anne has made arrangements at Floyd Medical Center for you to be taken care of by the Floyd Medical Center Family Practice Residency Program. This is the program in which Dr. Anne trained; the residents provide excellent care and are closely supervised by attending physicians. The resident physician usually sees the patient more than once a day and stays at the hospital all day on most days. This allows closer monitoring of labs and studies. For example, the doctor will often personally review x-rays with the radiologist rather than just read the paper report. If you are admitted to the hospital, be sure to put Dr. Anne as your primary care physician. This will ensure that copies of all records are sent to Valley Health Care.

Patients admitted to Redmond Regional Medical Center will be taken care of by several “hospitalist” physicians on staff. These are physicians who only attend patients while in the hospital and who do not maintain a traditional office. You will actually be followed more closely by the “hospitalist” than Dr. Anne (or any physician managing a busy office practice) would be able to do.

It is important for you to know that Dr. Anne has courtesy privileges at both hospitals. Even though she chooses to limit her practice to outpatient medicine, maintaining courtesy privileges is a sign that her colleagues recognize Dr. Anne’s expertise and level of training.

Dr. Anne regrets that she can’t follow patients both in the office and in the hospital. She realizes that hospitalization is a traumatic event and patients and their families need reassurance during such a time. However, she realized years ago that she couldn’t successfully be the “perfect” doctor always available no matter what and be a good mother to her three sons. Something had to give. This is why she decided to limit her practice to outpatient medicine.

Many patients are not aware that this is a huge trend in America that had its roots in European medicine. More and more physicians are limiting their practice to an outpatient office setting and using “hospitalists” to manage hospital care. Patients today are “sicker” when they are admitted to the hospital than in past years due to insurance limitations to hospital admissions. Sicker patients require closer monitoring which is difficult to provide if the doctor is trying to see an office full of patients all day long.

What if My Child Needs to See the Physician?
A parent or legal guardian must accompany patients who are minors on the patient's first visit. This accompanying adult (who consents to the treatment) is responsible for payment of the account, according to the policy outlined on the previous pages. We will not be involved in separation/divorce disputes. We see patients from ages 12 and up. If your child is younger and interested in becoming a patient, please let us know.

Patient Payment Policy

We are committed to the success of your medical treatment and care. Please understand that payment of your bill is part of this treatment and care.
All patients must complete our Patient Information Form. We believe that a good relationship is based on understanding and open communications. Our staff has been instructed to make every effort to clarify any issues concerning your balance.
For your convenience, we have answered a variety of commonly-asked financial policy questions below. If you need further information about any of these policies, please ask to speak with a patient representative or the Practice Manager.

How May I Pay?
We accept payment by cash, check, VISA, Mastercard, Discover and American Express. For your convenience, our billing office is staffed Monday through Thursday from 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM. The phone number is (706) 290-8111. You are expected to make payment in full upon receipt of a bill showing your balance due or according to the terms below:

Payment Plans
Payment Plans may be established for a $20.00 fee, following the terms below. An account set up on a payment plan is considered delinquent four (4) days after the agreed upon payment date.
Balance Due

When is my account delinquent?
An account is considered past due 30 days following billing unless other arrangements have been made. Unpaid accounts beyond 90 days are considered delinquent and may be forwarded to our collection agency and will have a service fee/billing fee added.

Are there Service Charges?
There will be a billing fee of $20.00 added to each statement billed after 75 days of service.

Is Interest Charged?
Patients with an outstanding balance over 60 days will be charged interest of 18%.

Phone calls to Doctors
Our physicians will not be doing telephone medicine; if you need to talk your doctor we will give you an appointment. Calling the doctors after hours will result in a charge which insurances do not pay-making you responsible.

Do I Need A Referral?
If you have an HMO plan with which we are contracted, you need a referral authorization in order to see a specialist. Most specialists will reschedule your appointment if you do not have a referral beforehand. You will most likely need to be seen first at VHC in order to evaluate the appropriateness of a referral.

What Is My Financial Responsibility for Services?
Your financial responsibility depends on a variety of factors, explained on page 3. Claims that have not been paid in 45 days will be automatically billed to you and we can assist you in refilling your insurance at your request.

What about missed appointments?
We would appreciate your help and courtesy of a call if you are unable to keep an appointment. Please notify our office at least twenty-four (24) hours prior to the appointment time. After two missed appointments, we reserve the right to charge you a missed appointment fee of $45.00. At this time, you will be asked to keep a credit card on file to make an appointment. Four missed appointments are grounds for patient discharge.

Returned Check Fee
A fee of $25.00 will be charged for all returned checks. This fee will be charged even if the check clears after trying a second time. After a second time of this occurring, you may be asked to keep a credit card on file.

Legal Fee:
Any patient sent to collections will be responsible for all collection fees. If a patient is taken to small claims court the patient will be responsible for all fees/charges.

TABLE HERE

Forms Requiring Office Visit
Most insurance plans will NOT cover most of the above fees. Many insurance companies will not cover an office visit related to the following: vaccine forms, college physicals, school physicals, sports physicals, filling out forms, writing letters for employers and others. You
should be prepared to pay out of pocket for these types of office visits. There is no additional fee charged for forms associated with an office visit. You may be charged a fax fee if you wish for us to fax a form for you.

Assignment of Benefits
You need to assign benefits/payments for your insurance payments to the doctor, Anne White MD PC. If you are unsure of this, please call you insurance provider.

Primary Care Provider
If you have a HMO insurance plan, many of them require you to list a Primary Care Provider or a PCP. This must be listed as Dr. White, or you will be responsible for full payment of services rendered. Please call you insurance company if you are unsure of this.

Medicare/Medicaid
We have recently begun to accept patients who have Medicare as their secondary insurance. We currently are not accepting patients who have Medicare only. We are currently not accepting any patients insured through Medicaid.

Emergencies after hours
If you need emergency medical care when the office is closed, please go to the ER or dial 911. If you need immediate assistance from the doctor on call, please call the office number at (706)295-5150, the doctor on call will have contact information on the automated answering service. A prescription refill is not an emergency. Fees may apply for calling the doctor on call during non-office hours.