Health plan gets local musicians singing 'Doctor, Doctor'
by Michael Corcoran
published August 11, 2005
originally published at: www.austin360.com
HAAM provides healthcare for uninsured musicians in Austin TX.
It wasn't long after he got his first guitar, at age 12, that Tony Redman knew exactly what he was going to do with his life. What he didn't know at the time was that the career of a professional musician is often one without health insurance or other benefits available to those who choose a more deliberate, "responsible" path. He didn't know that he'd be playing so many benefits for comrades with mounting medical bills and zero relief from Aunt Aetna.
Until July 22, the 34-year-old Redman had not seen a doctor in 15 years, and the last time the trip to the emergency room was pretty unavoidable; a 19-year-old Redman was stabbed in the stomach during a fight in the parking lot of a nightclub.
During the past two years, Redman had been experiencing a dull, lingering sort of pain in his lower abdomen and wondered if he'd suffered a hernia after years of lugging his equipment from gig to gig. "I didn't know what I had, but one thing I did know was that I couldn't afford to have it fixed," he says.
A 30-minute eligibility interview, proof of work and three references are all it took for Brendan Ryan, left, Tony Redman and Christ Gates to get an 'I Care' membership card, from Health Alliance of Austin Musicians.
About two months ago he heard about the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians (HAAM), a partnership between Seton Healthcare, St. David's Hospital and the SIMS Foundation that launched in April to help provide low-cost medical and free dental care to eligible musicians.
It sounded too good to be true, so initially Redman thought there was a catch. Then he started playing in a band with veteran Austin musician Chris Gates, whose treatment for asthma and a staph infection through his HAAM membership persuaded Redman to join. After a 30-minute eligibility interview, where he had to produce proof that he was a working musician (fliers, club ads, album credits) as well as three references in the local music industry, Redman received an "I Care" membership card from HAAM director Carolyn Schwartz, who works out of Insure-a-Kid offices at 1213 N. Interstate 35.
Schwartz, whose salary is paid by Seton, calls distributing the cards one of her favorite parts of the job. "Sometimes they'll say something like 'You have no idea how happy my mom's gonna be,' " she says. A requirement for membership is that the musician be without health insurance for at least three months before applying.
They must also be living at or below 250 percent of the poverty level (meaning an income of less than $24,000 a year), a figure most of the estimated 17,000 musicians in Austin would have no trouble qualifying for.
Although based on the health insurance model, with co-pays in the $15 to $30 range, HAAM is not technically the same as the medical coverage for which you pay a premium. Patients, for instance, must choose from three Seton community healthcare clinics that provide primary and preventive care for poor and uninsured people. And if they're referred to a specialist, the patient has to foot the bill.
Such was the case with Redman, who was referred to a gastroenterologist after his appointment at Seton, but was relieved when several other concerns were ruled out. "It's just nice to have the feeling that someone's health system has your best interests in mind," he says.
Musicians have also been raving about the St. David's dental vans, on loan from the Austin Independent School District, which have provided free treatments, ranging from teeth cleaning to root canals, for HAAM members during the summer.
"Some of the musicians hadn't been to the dentist in 10, 20 years," says Carol Clark of St. David's, "and they had the dental problems to prove it." Some spent as long as five and six hours in the chair and didn't have to pay a cent.
Currently, almost 250 musicians have signed up with HAAM, which has a ceiling of 500 slots in Seton's Care Plus program. (Interested musicians should call Schwartz at 322-5177 or log onto to www.healthallianceforaustinmusicians.org for more info.)
There has long been talk in Austin of starting a program to provide health care for uninsured musicians. But HAAM became a reality when Seton Vice President of Community Affairs Diana Resnick visited the New Orleans Musicians Clinic, sponsored by the same Daughters of Charity nuns as is Seton, late last year.
"As soon as I got back I called Robin Shivers (a longtime Seton board member and friend of Austin music) and said 'I think I've seen a model that could work for Austin,' and we were off and running." Shivers is in charge of raising money from the private sector -- early contributors to HAAM include Time Warner cable, South By Southwest and the Topfer Foundation.
"Everyone has been so supportive; it's really quite gratifying," says Schwartz, who's assembled quite a collection of locally produced CDs from appreciative new HAAM members. "Everyone, from the doctors and nurses and dentists, wants to give something back to the musicians, who add so much to the quality of life in Austin."