Sigh.
Just got notice from my insurance HPHC that they will only support Abbott's freestyle strips. My daughters are on the Minimed pumps which uses OneTouch. Now I need not only 2 exceptions for coverage, but also have to pay almost double to continue to use the OneTouch strips. Argh. After calling HPHC, they said my kids can "just" manually enter the BG readings from a FreeStyle meter. WTF! An 8 yr old + manual entry = disaster! Anyway, what have we come to? Purely an economic driven approach to health care...This is wrong at a number of levels! Their Endo mentioned some companies restrict coverage to novalog and not homolog because of some "deal". This definitely proves my thoughts that Diabetes will never be cured, there's too much money to be made...sigh....rant over...
That is terrible! I hate health insurance so much. It is a necessary evil that causes more stress than good half of the time. I have been trying to figure out what things my insurance will cover on their website, but I have this sinking feeling inside that what they say they cover... and what they actually will cover when I take a wad of scripts to the pharmacy... will be totally different.
I guess there's nothing you can get from the doctor saying that they NEED to be on the OneTouch glucometers because of their age?? Probably not, but I would be trying. If I had a child.. and they were 8 years old... I wouldn't want them messing with the pump more than they had to either!
I hear you palominovet...
Insurance, it's unfortunately a necessary evil. The problem I have is they just pulled this on us out of the blue (effective 4/1). They've covered it in the past so I am quite upset that the policy changes mid-year! Even if I had my doctor file for an exemption, and approved, the cost increases alone will be substantial! Maybe we will consider an omnipod, which in the end will cost more than the minimed...
I had issues with Blue Cross Anthem not covering my one touch strips bc I was testing a lot... new to Type one and exercise induced lows... I found a site where I could get them 100/ for around 75.00, no tax, no shipping and showed up in three days. Still a lot of $, but they are cheaper then a buck a piece from the pharmacy. My new doc somehow got the rejection overruled and now I get 300 per month. Keep complaining and get your doc's office to call. Good luck. cheapdiabetesteststrips.com
Hi - You should ask your Endo's office to appeal and request a tier exception. It's one thing for an adult to manually enter the information but asking a child to do that is just asking for emergency room visits and someone at HPHC should be made aware of that.
It is scary because HPHC is a good health insurance company...
Maurie
Ironically, I wanted to use the freestyle (I enter manually) but my insurance company makes me use One Touch. My company is BCBS. Weird system of health care. Certainly not geared to the patient. That's my rant!
Back in 2008 when I went on the OmniPod, my BCBS insurance had the One Touch at tier 1 and Freestyle at the higher tier with the higher co-pay. I sent them an appeal letter and said since they paid for the OmniPod, they should also pay for the test strips that the OmniPod uses. I won the appeal. It may be worth a try....
I got this letter a month or so ago, as well. Its disgusting how companies are trying to monopolize the market at the expense of diabetics. But... such is capitalism.
Yes, sigh...capitalism, good or bad? It depends...:-)
I will pursue the exception with my daughter's endo in April. I'll post the results.
Can they do that? can they dictate what brand you have to buy? That seems wrong on every level. Holy crap!! I honestly shake my head at the US medical system...how can you stand it? Every other G8 country runs on a socialist system for medical care (all the same for each citizen) and yet the US is a for profit system! Health care is a necessity not a commodity.