Meleissa
Webster,#2Consumer Comment
Sun, December 07, 2008
Dr. Noie and Unicare Dental need to be put out of business. Finally his former patients are getting organized and complaining! Like Laura, my mouth looks worse after being worked on by Dr. Noie. The crowns in the back of my mouth do not match the rest of my teeth. They are poor quality too. After less than 2 years, I've had three of them replaced by another dentist. I could not return to Unicare for any reason . I am convinced this dentist and his staff deliberately damaged my teeth when I was under sedation. This guaranteed return business for them when I returned in six months for a cleaning. If I could prove it, I would have everyone there arrested. Dentists do not sign the hipocratic oath that Medical Doctors do btw.
Js2345
League City,#3Consumer Comment
Fri, November 07, 2008
Unlike Ms. Laura, I have no financial stake in this matter. it is a shame to what extend some people go to avoid paying for services they received. Dr. Noie is wonderful. He is a perfectionist and stands behind his work all the way. I have been his patient for over 5 years and have had several dental work done. He has never hurt me, not even when he gives me a shot. I have had my share of bad dentistry but Dr. Noie changed all that. People like to complaint when they have been wronged. It is only fair to compliment someone that has done good by you. Right now, when I have an appointment at Dr. Noie's office, Unicare, I have absolutely no worries and that is quit a change for me. I love Dr. Noie. He has restored my faith on dental field. Even though I have moved from Clear Lake area, I still drive about 40 miles to see Dr. Noie. That is how much I trust him. I feel fortunate to have found him. I love my smile and my dentist. :-)
Theresa
Danbury,#4UPDATE EX-employee responds
Wed, July 23, 2008
I worked for Dr. Noie for nearly 4 years and I have never seen him treat any of his patients unfairly or diagnosis treatment that was un-needed or that the patient did not want, and I have never seen Dr. Noie do work on a patient that they did not authorize prior to appointment. For Ms. Laura to state otherwise is an absolute UNTRUTH. Laura was never guaranteed that her medical insurance would pay for her surgeries, and anyone who works in the medical/dental field would never do that because the first thing an insurance company will tell you is that any information they give you is an estimate and not a guarantee for coverage or payment. When Ms. Laura came to the office last June of 2007 for her children's cleaning appointments her medical insurance was verified and a pre-determination was sent, in August of 2007 MS. Laura stopped by the office and her treatment plan was given along with the Estimate of Coverage from her insurance company, she received and signed her treatment plan and wanted to schedule her work right away. Only a small part of Ms. Laura's treatment plan was even considered under medical insurance and she was aware that the rest of the treatment she was receiving was her out of pocket expense and would be her responsibility to pay, which in December of 2007 Ms.Laura did in the amount of $5,000 on her Care Credit account, the office had a full consent from Ms. Laura to run that charge. I have been in the field of dentistry for nearly eleven years and in all my experience I have never seen a MRI done for placement of dental implants, and have never seen it as standard procedure in any office I have worked at or referred patients to. As for Unicare Dental committing insurance fraud, again anyone who works in the dental/medical profession and works with insurance knows that any claim that is sent in to an insurance company needs to have documentation regarding the date of service, along with pre-and post op x-rays and narrative, I have never seen any staff member at Dr. Noie's office send in a claim to an insurance company that did not need to be sent to re-mit payment. I think Ms. Laura is forgetting that she had other treatment done at Dr. Noie's office that her new insurance company was going to pay for, I think she forgot one insurance was expiring in September of 2007 and a new was starting, and that the beautiful anterior crowns and veneers that Dr. Noie did (that Laura loved) in December were to be covered under her new insurance, and I think she forgot that her account that was charged was her co-payment for the beautiful anterior crowns and veneers (that she loved) that Dr. Noie did.
Fn77598
Webster,#5REBUTTAL Individual responds
Wed, July 09, 2008
Either Ms. Laura has selective memory or she is just trying to get her teeth fixed and not pay for it, one way or another. Now let's talk about FACTS: FACT #1: Ms. Laura was presented with a detailed treatment plan for proposed dental surgeries on August 31, 2007. She was also presented with written informed consent. She read, signed and dated it. FACT#2: Ms. Laura was presented with a copy of our office financial policy which she read, signed and dated. In that form it explains n detail that Unicare will obtain an Estimate of Benefits from insurance company, it continues in bold and capital letters that ANY AMOUNT NOT PAID BY INSURANCE COMPANY WITHIN 45 DAYS IS THE PATIENT'S RESPONSIBILITY IN FULL. She initialed next to this line and signed and dated it. She even initialed next to a line that reads: I have read and understand all of the financial policies provisions outlined above by Unicare Dental. Ms. Laura has been my patient since 2005. She was referred to me by a very good patient who has been my patient along with her entire family since 2000, over seven years. On November of 2005 she came for a full examination with complaint of pain on several teeth. She stated that she have always had problem with her teeth. On that visit she was diagnosed with several badly decayed teeth. There was no mention of any dental Implants on that visit. The proposed treatment plan included Root canal on some badly damaged teeth, Porcelain crown for 7 teeth, filling for a few others, and extraction of some back teeth because she elected to pull them instead to save money. FACT #3: The total cost of proposed treatment was around $8000 not $24000. Ms. Laura started the treatment by doing only one crown on her upper right Canine due to financial restrictions. The treatment was completed in March of 2006. On June of 2006 Ms. Laura brought her two girls to our office as new patients. She must have been happy with our office and trusted us enough to bring her daughters to our office for check up and treatment. Besides, Ms. Laura returned to our office again on June of 2006 for elective routine periodic examinations and cleaning. This action is inconsistent with her claim of someone who is shocked with $24,000 price tag, in tears. FACT #4: Ms. Laura was very happy with our office or she would not bring her children to us and return for more treatment later on. On August of 2007 Ms. Laura returned to our office with complaint of pain on several teeth again. The conditions of her teeth were deteriorating further and she elected to save mainly her front teeth and remove the ones that needed Root canal. She did not want Root canals. Over the next month I extracted several teeth that were grossly decayed to the nerve. I also performed a right Maxillary sinus lift and placed 3 Dental implants on the upper right in place of extracted teeth and repaired the Jaw bone on the lower right. Ms. Laura paid $2515.70 on a $6840 treatment on August of 2007. She also read and signed the new revised treatment plan. She read, signed, and dated under this statement. I have read and accepted the above treatment plan; I understand that Unicare dental has agreed to file a claim for the services provided with my insurance company. Any charges not covered by my insurance company will be my responsibility and I shall make payment in full promptly. I further understand that the co-pay for each visit is due at the check-in. Her signed treatment plan, signed, and initialized several written informed consent to the treatment plan, and later on making and keeping the appointment to perform the surgery is not consistent with her accusations. Any treatment that was performed on Ms. Laura was printed, reviewed, signed, and dated by her. She also read, initialized, signed, and dated 3 different informed written consent forms with multiple initials. Her accusation of getting unscheduled treatment is FALSE and inconsistent with facts and reality. FACT#5: Every procedure that was performed in the two surgeries were approved and consented by her in writing. Obtaining an MRI is not a standard procedure for placement of dental Implants. I am confident no Dentist that performs Implant surgery will go on record to say so because it is simply not the case. Either she made another FALSE statement or she will produce that statement in writing. FACT #6: MRI images are very rarely used in Oral Implantology and it is not a standard procedure. About charging her Credit card for $5000; this charge took place on December of 2007, (over a month for restoration of her front teeth). It included a total of 7 porcelain crowns and Porcelain veneers for her upper front teeth at the cost of $6412. This treatment was unrelated to the dental Implants and past surgeries. My administrative staff member who directly dealt with Ms. Laura was Ms. Theresa Ziegler. Unfortunately she has been on medical leave of absence due to an unfortunate complication during delivery of her son on January 1st of 2008. Her new born son is very sick. He has lived most of his young life in the Neonatal ICU at Hermann and has endured multiple surgeries since he was born. She has been at her son's bedside since. I tried not to bother her with this matter, but I finally ask her some of these questions via email last weekend. Here are her comments: Question (Me): Did you run her care credit for $5000 on 12/5/2008 with her authorization? Answer (Theresa): Yes I ran her care credit that day and it was with her verbal authorization, because I had previously had her sign a sales draft for signature on file. Question (Me): Did you ever give Laura any guaranty that Medical insurance will pay for the balance of the surgery? Answer (Theresa): No I never verbally or in writing gave a guarantee that the medical would pay, because they don't give that type of guarantee. FACT #7: Her accusation of overcharging her credit card for dental surgery is FALSE. The payment was for restoring 7 of her front teeth for a total fee $6412. The payment was made on the exact same day of her appointment for restorative work. Over two months after the last surgery. Ms. Laura is fully aware of Theresa's ongoing tragedy. Like most doctors, I am not involved in details of daily administrative transactions. I spend my day caring for my patients. As a courtesy to her and since Theresa was unavailable to defend herself, I offered to write off $4314.30 which would be equivalent to about what her medical insurance company would have paid for the procedure. In conclusion, you can't trust everything that you read on internet. We often have to let our common sense guide us. Just recently I came across a website that claims God hates shrimp (http://www.godhatesshrimp.com/) or another one that claims Texas is the worst place to live in United States (http://bayareahouston.blogspot.com/2007/02/its-official-texas-worst-place-to-live.html). Does that make it true? Not to my knowledge. I have live in Houston for about 20 years and have served the Bay Area since 1996. Our practice is steadily growing. One can't remain in good standing with a community for a long time unless he/she practices good and fair business principles. I DEMAND THAT MS. LAURA PROVIDE SOME PROOF TO BACK UP HER ACCUSATIONS.