Oxygen Suppliers

[Guest guest]

Advocate for yourself. Don't settle. Advocate for yourself. Don't

settle. It's a matter of life and death. It's a matter of living the

best life you can.

Just to prove I do as I often say. I was with a local provider who

initially gave excellent and very personal service. However, I became

somewhat concerned with slippage last summer and talked to a national

provider. Ultimately we held off doing anything because it was the

middle of the whole medicare bidding fiasco. Then I let it pass.

However, recently, they balked at filling my reservoir in my van (good

reason but should have come before they filled it six months and also

problem could have been easily solved). They also said they wouldn't

provide a reservoir for my van all the time. I called Lincare. They

agreed to everything I asked for. I switched.

Now, why do I think all this change took place with my provider? Simple.

They are having financial issues. The reduction in what medicare pays

has made them not profitable. They have told all employees there will be

no increases and lost many. They've reduced the number of routes putting

more deliveries on each. So, there is good explanation for their overall

reduction in service attitude and it's likely to get worse. I made the

change before more significant problems could occur.

Now, making the change, I did get all new equipment. Both reservoirs are

new-the one for my home and car. The Marathon is new and works much

better than the one I had. I've actually been able to use demand some.

So, advocating is long term.