Thursday, July 02, 2009

Insurance Companies suck

It is 4:30 in the morning here in sunny California ( well at least it will be sunny in a few hours) and I've already been up an hour. I woke up to terrible joint pain. Last night was Rebif night and the side effects have decided to make themselves known. I'm not one to take any extra medication (they have me on so much now I don't want to take anything else) but i had to take my prn prescription pain medication. I'm in that much pain.

We're still waiting for the da*# insurance company to approve me going to UCLA for the Tysabri evaluation. It's already been two weeks. I wish they would get off their collective asses and approve it. Can't wait till Obama Bs's his way into a National Health Care System. The government can't manage anything they do now except line their own pockets. I have to wait this long with a private Blue Shield Plan, can't wait to see how long I'd wait under a National plan.

However, this isn't a political blog, so I'll try to limit my complaining to just my insurance company and other world events. Like Michael Jackson. I've HEARD ENOUGH. Bury the man and move on for Pete's sake. I'm sick of every news station still covering his death as if he was the President or the Queen for goodness sake. Yikes am I on a roll or what this morning?!

Back to rationality and the insurance issue. Fortunately, because I ended up in the hospital and rehab after my last exacerbation I was placed in the "high risk" program that Blue Shield has. This means I get a call every week from a nurse to discuss any "issues". I'm going to call her this morning and see if she can help speed these authorizations through. Now that my husband and I have decided that Tysarbi is the way to go as far as treatment, I just want to start it and get off this bloody Rebif.

I decrease my steroid dose to 20 mg a day today. Yeah....it's only taken a little over two months to reach that dose. Two weeks on 20 then I drop to 10. I wonder how long it will be before the weight starts coming off? Anyone want to start a poll? Tara? LOL

Well, that's enough for now........everyone have a great day and stay cool!

2 comments:

Living Day to Day with Multiple Sclerosis said...

I am reading this now and wondering what part I should poll? Insurance problems or how long it takes for the weight to come off. Or could it be how much longer we will be listening to the Michael Jackson death commentary?

I can tell you that the weight takes a long time to come off. I hate to give you bad news when you are already down. For some odd reason, steroid weight is the hardest weight to get rid of. I fight this battle every day.

As for the insurance companies... They suck and sometimes I wonder if it would be better to be on a PPO plan. I am on Blue Cross HMO also and struggle all the time with them. Also I know that on a PPO plan they cover massage therapy along with many other specialty therapies that I hear help with MS. However, I would lose my Doctors if I did this.

As for the Rebif... I had horrendous pains with it. I would get stuck on the stairs having to wake up my husband and son to carry me down the stairs. It felt like every bone was about to break. I told my Neuro I was never taking another shot again and then he convinced me to try Copaxone. It has been much better. I really do hope and I have every finger and toes crossed that you get approved for the Tysarbi.

Send me a post with what questions you want on the poll and I will do it.

Hang in there!
Tara

Living Day to Day with Multiple Sclerosis said...

I can not believe I lost my whole blog and Polls. I don't know if you noticed but I restarted them but we had a really good turnout the first few days and now I have to try to get everyone to come back and answer again. If you have any ideas on how to get them back let me know.
I love your Husbands line of Eco Friendly stuff. Very interesting!!!