Carmella's Hang Out

I was going to wait until I knew for certain that things would work out, but I fear that if I do that it will be almost anti-climactic! lol. Y’all might say, “This is what you have been ‘keeping secret’ for over a month now?? Whats the big deal?” OR, even worse, I am afraid it might, at this rate, not even happen now!! Plus, I am rather frustrated with it all right now, and want others to share in my frustration!!

As I have said before, my therapist is really wonderful! One of the things that set her apart from others I have dealt with in the past, is that she didn’t take my prognosis as “Never out of pain” as a reason to no longer TRY for less to no pain. Right away, she looked at what we were up against with my back, and recommended a long term option. I must say, I was rather giddy when she first suggested it!! We were talking about how both my doctor and the therapist before, said I would never be out of pain…for the rest of my life. She agreed, and said there was only so much that she too could do for me. However, she didn’t like the idea of me having to take pain meds for the rest of my life. At first, she said we should look into a TENS unit. That was at one of my very first appointments. At the next one, she said she was going to write up a prescription for something called a home IFC unit, and send it to my doctor to have him sign it.

I of course came right home and looked to see what an IFC unit was. I found that it meant Interferential Current and, in short, is the stym treatment I get at PT three times a week!!!! YAYAYAYAY!!! Thats right! The little bursts of current treatments that cause me to walk out of the office PAIN free is something I can do at home! It is a fully portable machine that I can wear at anytime that I am not operating heavy machinery {i.e. I cant drive with the unit on, and I would not be able to use it while at work with the carousel and all} The electrical current actually tricks the nerves into not feeling pain! It is like a wonderful massage that helps me move and feel better.

First “Grrr to the doctor!!”: The prescription was sent to my doc’s office on January 26th, and they printed it out at the office on the 27th. And then we waited. And waited, and waited, and waited. Finally, on February 13th, the signed prescription arrived by mail, at the PT office. Now, I should mention that my therapist had filled the entire thing out herself, all my doctor had to do was sign the thing and have his staff stick it in the mail! Ok, thats ok. We had waited, but I had it now. I was happy…no ecstatic! I was so excited to finally hold in my hand a piece of paper that could mean the difference between rolling out of bed, and laying there for over an hour hoping the pain will go away before I get up. {however, I do want to mention that since doing this therapy, and going three times a week, I really am doing so much better! Praise the Lord! I know I am getting stronger, and I healing, and even the scar itself has changed shape, look, feel and does not have the same pain it did before. See, because the incision healed poorly, my first therapist was not able to work on the cut very much. This meant that the muscles underneath were allowed to bunch up, and pull the rest of my back out. Meaning that had the scar healed right in the first place, I may have had less pain for the past three years. In the past, even the skin of the cut would hurt! Still felt like a cut at times.}

That same day, Mum and I took the prescription to the Home Medical Supply shop. {It should be mentioned here that I go to a doctor who works for the same hospital my father works at. The Medical Supply place is also owned by this hospital, my therapist works for this hospital, and our insurance is through this very same hospital.} There, we were told they had to send the ’script in to the insurance company to get it approved: this could take up to a week.

The next day, I got a call from Medical Supply to say that insurance had called to say that I now needed a letter of medical necessity before they could ok the IFC unit. Ok, so I guess a prescription saying “IFC unit for pain management” signed by a back surgeon, is not enough of a medical necessity letter, but thats fine…ok so not really fine, I was still a little miffed at that point, but anyway.

The first day that I called the office, the phones were down, so I had to call the other two that my doctor works out of, just to get to the place to leave a message to tell them what I needed. I am pretty sure I left two messages there for his medical assistant, and she never called me back. So, the next day I start calling the office that has all my records, and finally get through. However, while I am able to talk to a real person, they just let me leave messages for people, who never call me back! I called the medical assistant there, I called Medical records twice, and nothing. Then, while I am at PT the Records department calls to say they need to ‘verify’ message I left! Grr! Since I was not home, I had to call back and leave yet another message, this time telling them the entire story again, AND leaving the fax number for the medical supply place. More time goes by, and no one is calling me. My therapist tried to get a hold of them to remind them that is is no little matter, this is for a PAIN MANAGEMENT item! However, she too was only allowed to leave a message and as far as I know was never contacted by the office staff!

By Thursday we had had enough. Since we were going to be going past the office to take a friend to the airport, we decided to stop in and talk to them face to face, maybe get them to do something if we were right there. I walked in and talked to the front desk, who had never heard of my calls and knew nothing of what I spoke. She told me that was not her job, letters of medical necessity, that was the job of medical records. So, she called med records and handed me the phone to once again explain what I needed: “The doctor has already given me a prescription. However, the insurance company says that is not good enough, and they need a letter saying I really need this machine.” She tells me “Thats not my job, I don’t deal with that. That is front desk, you will have to talk to the lady that gave you the phone.”

I was ready to cry. It seems that all I can get from this place is the run around, and the buck being passed. I told the woman at the desk that I had been told it was her job, she rolled her eyes, said she knew it wasn’t, then wrote down my story, and went back to talk to the medical assistant. The doctors assistant came out, also having no idea what I wanted done! OY. Seems no one knew, for one thing, what an IFC unit was! When I explained what it was she said “Oh, so its like a TENS unit?” and then called med records AGAIN to tell them it WAS their job. In explaining to the medical assistant what I needed, I made sure to mention many times that I have been told I will never be out of pain {hoping she would catch on how important this was to me}, made sure she knew the Doc already knew about it and oked it, plus, I told all of them that I had been trying to get this done for over a week now and wanted it done NOW. She wrote out a note, told the front desk to fax it over to records, and told me it would be taken care of. The front desk told me they were putting URGENT on the fax, because being put on hold, and ignored for a week was horrible.

I was told that the woman in records would go on lunch from 12 to 1, but after that I was to call and make sure she had faxed the letter. After 1 I called, but they did not even so much as have a voice mail on! It just kept sending me back to the main menu when I tried to call them!! Since I had to go to work, I could not keep calling them over and over, so I left it till the next day. Friday {thats yesterday…yeah, it has taken THIS long to get this far! The first fax was sent from PT on January 26th!!} I called the supply shop to check that they got the fax. Guess what? They hadn’t! I was making the call from the van on the way to PT, so Mum made the next call for me,while I was doing my therapy work out. This one was to the doctors Medical records. Get this….the woman who I talked to the day before, who both the desk and the med assistant talk to also, the woman who’s name I was given on a card when told to call and make sure she had sent the fax, told Mum she had never heard of me and didn’t know what Mum was talking about!! Its a good thing Mum made the call, I think I would have burst into tears at that moment.

She then went on to say she had no fax there from the main office, and that “she was new” and didn’t even know HOW to write a letter of medical necessity so she didn’t think she could help!!! After putting Mum on hold for nearly five minutes, she came back with the fax from the main office and said that it had not been put on her desk nor had it been marked urgent. THEN, she pretty much said that she had not done anything about this before {i.e. the reason they had been ignoring me for a week} because this was something they were suppose to get from the insurance company, not the patient. Ok, now how, if she was new and didn’t know anything about these kinds of letters , could she know that it is the insurance and not the patient that asks for the letter? And, if she had never heard of me before, though we know that is not true since she is the very same woman I spoke with on the phone while standing in the doctors office, how could she know that they had indeed been ignoring me for a week?

Mum explained that it was the company that called the supply place, and told them I had to get the letter, and finally the woman said she would have to wait until Monday to write it, since that is when her supervisor is in the office and can ‘help her write it’ since she does not know how to word it. {Um how about “Patient has chronic back pain due to several back conditions.”? Or “Patient in much pain. IFC unit needed for less pain”??? I am sure she could think of something!} Mum told her she would be calling back on Monday to make sure the fax had been sent, and the woman told her “Well, I am probably going to need the doctor to sign it, and he is not in till Tuesday”.

I’m so tired of this place ignoring me, putting me off, and giving me the run around! I have now been waiting on this machine for a month! The really distressing part, is that this very same type of thing happened three years ago when I went there the first time! I went in, had an MRI done and took the films to the office. My doctor had told me that he was going to be on vacation for three weeks, but that he wanted them to send him the films as soon as they got them, so he could have another doc treat me if needed. I let the staff know that when I took the films in, and they said that there was no possible way they could get a hold of him and they were not going to interrupt his vacation. That left me thinking they would hand the case over to another doctor {there are nearly a dozen other doctors in that practice, many of whom are also back surgeons} and have him look at it. Did they? No, they left the films on my doctors desk for three weeks, until he got back from vacation. Once he did see them, he freaked out {much like me} because of the condition of my back. Now, thankfully, things were not as he had first thought them. His first impression from the films was that the pain and all the problems were caused by that broken vertebrae {the spondylolisthesis} Had that been the case, in that three weeks there is the possibility that I could have been paralyzed! If it was a new break, and it was causing the pain, it could have cut my spinal cord. However, since it was an old break, and it was a disc blown causing the problems, my spinal cord was not in immediate danger. Yet, it was still a huge problem that had to be taken care of right away, and I was in for surgery the next week. But, the office staff put me off for three weeks then! And they are doing it all over again this time!

That is where it has been left! I still don’t know what is going to happen, and I don’t know when they are going to decide they want to help me. It is such a frustrating position to be in. It is like the hospital does not even trust the doctors they employ, since they have to have so many checks and letters and such. And I feel horrid to have this happen for my Dad’s sake,too. He has worked for this hospital for 16 years and the hospital treats him and his family like this. And to think, if we had another insurance, I may have had my IFC unit by now! heh. I would have paid for it myself by now, if it were not for the fact that we don’t know just how much it is! The unit may be only $100 or it could be $1,000 and more.

The other down side, is I need two more prescriptions! lol!! And now I am afraid to call and get them! I don’t want to deal with them anymore. My therapist will call for one of them, so that is an upside…I will let her deal with them and try to get them to work. After next Friday, I will need another prescription for four more weeks of therapy. {I am not to the point where we are ready to end therapy, but my first script was for 4-6 weeks. Thankfully, unlike last time, my therapist does not want to stop too early and have me not healed as much as we can get. I am allowed 24 visits before I have to go back to the doctor for him to see if it is doing anything. So far I have been to 15, and at 18 we just need a prescription for the left over visits.} Shortly after surgery, though, my doctor gave me a prescription for a back brace. I have used that thing so many times, and I am so very thankful for it! I know I would have been in a great deal more pain if it were not for that! However, I was 30 pounds or so more at that time, then now. The brace is getting too big and does not help as much. I just need to get a smaller size, and for that I need him to write me another prescription. I have not decided if I want to risk trying that on Monday, since I think I would be dealing with other people and MAY get more help with them, or if I want to concentrate on one thing at a time and get the IFC unit before trying again! Sigh.

Thanks for letting me rant for a bit.

And, yeah…YAY, that was some of my news! heh. I may {oh I so hope, I hope} get an Interferential Current machine that will help keep me in less pain!! Yahoo!!