Behind the closed doors of the corporate boardroom, a managed care cost-control group had voted not to honor a treating doctor's prescription enabling the child to have this test. The treating doctor would have to treat the patient without the diagnostic information that this test provides. The stated reason was that the cost of the test was too expensive. The name of managed care is cost-control, and profits, profits, profits.
Corporate profit is the overriding objective of managed care.
Key to corporate profit is controlling costs. Money spent on patients for diagnostic tests and treatment subtracts from the bottom line and reduces profitability. The less cost, the more profit. Cost-control starts with the doctors, especially those whose acquiescence allows corporate policy to dictate what will be done for patients. Given the for-profit model, it is no surprise that the epileptic child was denied.