Delays, changes in insurance payments force closing of pain center

One of the few dedicated fibromyalgia clinics in the Chicago area closed Thursday, its founder citing reduced insurance reimbursements as forcing him out of business.

Dr. Michael McNett, director of the Center for Fibromyalgia, Fatigue and Chronic Pain, closed offices in Elk Grove Village, Hoffman Estates and Chicago, and filed for liquidation under Chapter 7 bankruptcy. He said that since the financial market crisis in the fall, private insurers had reduced or delayed payments by 30 percent, refusing to pay for treatments they'd paid previously.

McNett fears he may be a canary in the coal mine for other primary care practices that rely on patient visits for most of their business, rather than well-compensated surgical procedures.

"An old adage says doctors get paid for what they do with their hands, not their heads," he said.

What McNett did primarily was prescribe medications and other treatments for fibromyalgia, a little-understood condition characterized by chronic pain in much of the body, sleep problems, fatigue and depression.

There is no lab test for diagnosis, no known cause, no known cure, and it resembles some other conditions such as lupus or chronic fatigue, which makes some doctors question whether it is a legitimate disease.

Patients at the clinic at St. Alexian Brothers Medical Center, like 58-year-old Deborah Eikelberg of Lake in the Hills, said McNett understood their condition and helped them manage it. Bent over and taking oxycontin and myriad other drugs for fibromyalgia and lupus, she said she will be "miserable" if she has to go without meds while searching for another physician.

"It's a sad day," she said. "Doctors who understand the problem of chronic pain and do something about it - prescribe the proper medications, monitor them, see patients every month, refill prescriptions - that's not common."

Another patient, Pam Gast, of downstate Earlville, drove two hours to see McNett after seeing other doctors who left her "hopeless" and in tears.

"He got it," she said. "I always felt good about the plan. If one medication didn't work, he was always willing to try something else."

Under McNett, Gast got a prescription for Xyrem, which helped her to get enough sleep to keep working.

Departing patients got referrals to other doctors, and the National Fibromyalgia Association offers a professional directory at fmaware.org.