CHRONIC TONIC posts on Thursdays at 9 EST, it is a place to share stories, advice, and information and to connect with others with chronic health conditions and those who care for them. Our diarists will report on research, alternative treatments, clinical trials, and health insurance issues through personal stories. You are invited to share in comments (and note if you'd like to be a future diarist). In addition to our weekly diaries, please join us for ongoing conversations at the Kossacks Networking site.
Please remember to visit the Thursday Night Heathcare Series. Tonight's Diarist: MsGrin
It's a newish year still, and I'm still trying to get the hang of my new insurance plan which is a * gasp * a fee for service plan, and it's been something like fifteen years since I've had one of those previously, so I'm not entirely sure that 'you can use any provider who will accept our payments' really means what it seems to state. Accordingly, I need to wait to see if I can actually use the blood lab I had been using previously. So far, I've tested and the results got to my doctor's office - now we'll see if the insurance actually pays for it. The two labs I used while I was traveling either faxed my results to random doctors' offices (i.e. not my physician, someplace else in town) or just sat on the results for a week or more at a time while we waited to see if my medication needed adjustment. The first office LITERALLY had zero phone numbers patients could use, either at the lab draw facility or nationally - had to drive to the collection site and have THEM phone the three times my results didn't show up.
But before any of these changes, my previous plan would get weird about sending my medications through the mail order service, and then I hit the doughnut hole right at about Thanksgiving, and it ended up taking over a month to get my antibiotics refilled (after developing an allergy to the previous drug) but my supplements DID come in, and everything got put on hold. Didn't have the meds I needed. Couldn't get lab results to my docs to make sure my bloodthinners weren't out of whack (which they have been), so I couldn't start the supplements I seem to need... round and around I went.
So now I'm hanging with friends on their farm again, trying to get my head reoriented to this city I've been loving so much, trying to remember where my things are and what messes need to be sorted out in what order as well as how I can begin the next phase of my physical and neurological recovery.
Thought I'd take a moment to introduce you to the the places I am and the specialists I've been consulting recently to continue getting body and mind together:
Love you all...
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