Starting REMICADE Monday

[Guest guest]

Woot Woot! After nearly 4 weeks after my doctor prescribed it, I will be

starting Remicade on Monday. I cannot wait.

You may ask... Why almost 4 weeks? Well... My chart sat on someone's desk for 2

weeks waiting for the drug rep to come in. No one can answer me WHY that is

other than the fact my insurance told them they had to provide the meds through

my prescription plan and they didn't want to since they do a " buy and bill " so

rather than call me and say " You will need to go to the hospital to have this

done " .... They sat on my chart for 2 WEEKS seeing if the drug company could

help. HELLO? My insurance WILL PAY for the meds, I just can't have them done

THERE. What could a drug rep have done? Give them to me for free? I don't think

so!

So basically... They want their patients to have the medication infused at the

office. My insurance company says " Oh! You can do that but you have to get the

meds from our specialty pharmacy! " The doctor's ofice does not administer any

meds that they don't themselves provide so rather than calling me and saying

" You will need to go to the hospital for this " they wait 2 weeks til the drug

rep comes in. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE??????

Hell hath no fury worse than a woman in pain AND tapering prednisone. I was more

than a tad miffed. They called my insurance on 2/2 to verify benefits. Knowing

what they did,(my insurance company told me) they should have called ME 2/3 and

told me I would have to go to the hospital rather than have it done in their

office. I called 2/16 to see what was going on and... well... opened up a whole

can of chaos. They even had the DOCTOR call me. OVER AN INSURANCE ISSUE! Can you

imagine?

Moral of the story: Be your own biggest and best advocate. Don't back down

either.

Sorry for the rambling. I am excited and nervous at the same time! :-)