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(ROCKVILLE, MD – Dec. 22, 2003) The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) has developed an Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Health Plan Report Card. The report card presents a comprehensive picture of a variety of health plans and provides information on coverage of audiology and speech-language pathology services, limitations of coverage and provider accessibility.
The health plans represented in the report card are those of small, medium, and large organizations as well as unions, military, Medicare, and national fee-for service plans available through the Federal Employee Health Benefit (FEHB) Program, and were judged good, fair, and poor. Health plans were downgraded for withholding information or not reporting coverage information to discourage case-by-case decision making.
ASHA’s model benefits for speech-language pathology and audiology were used as a benchmark, against which each health plan was rated. Model benefits can be found on ASHA’s Web site.
The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) is the national professional, scientific, and credentialing association for more than 110,000 audiologists, speech, language pathologists, and speech, language, and hearing scientists. Audiologists specialize in preventing and assessing hearing disorders as well as providing audiologic treatment including hearing aids. Speech-language pathologists identify, assess, and treat speech and language problems including swallowing disorders.
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