Elena D. Ghiaur, MD

I gave her a two, because although she has a nice chairside manner... well, I'll just state the facts. During our very first patient visit, I let her know that I have a low grade monoclonal gammopathy. That seemed to scare her and she kept insisting that I should be under the care of a hematologist. I told her that in the prior 10 years, I had been to 4 different hematologists, and they ALL said my paraproteins were low enough that ANY internist should be able to do the yeary monitoring tests as long as the paraproteins remain low. They have indeed remained qite low, but every year she gives me flack about ordering the tests. That's number one. I have complex medical issues, was already under the care of a bunch of medical specialists, but needed her to monitor a number of basic things which had been abnormal, and some which needed treatment. These included lipids, c-reactive ptotein, items in the comprehensive metabolic panel, vitamin d, thyroid etc. All very basic stuff that… an internist should be able to do, and which Medicare WILL pay for if medical necessity is properly coded on the lab order. But when I went to LabCorp with the order, she hadn't coded them right. They said medicare would not pay for several of the tests because she had not shown the proper medical justification codes. They wanted me to sign a waiver that I would pay. So I took it across the street to Quest, and they told me the same thing. I have a doctoral degree in a health field, and I knew there were good medical justifications in my case for the tests she had ordered. So, I went home and looked up all the codes she had shown. She had shown all the same justifications for all the tests ordered, and left out important ones that really were needed to justify certain tests. It was totally screwy. I had to go back to her office or call them two or three times before she got the coding straightened out. Ultimately, I had to go look up the justification codes myself and give them to the secretary. Only then did Labcop accept the order without demanding I sign a waiver. And medicare paid it all without a hitch. But every year, when it's time for new testing, we go through the same thing And I end up having to look up the justification codes so that Medicare will pay for what she has ordered. I refuse to take a financial it on this when a doc is too lazy or pressed for time to look up the proper justification codes for tests she wants done. Out of all my specialists, she's the only one for whose orders Labcorp demands waivers. Sadly, most of her other patients don't have a medical background, so when their insurance or medicare doesn't pay, they are probably blaming the insurance or medicare, and are cluless to the possibility of the orders being improperly coded. So sad. I'm tired of it. She's fired

Dr. Ghiaur is an excellent physician, very thorough in her approach to health care.