After all my years on Medicare i never knew that part"B" would cover my insulin. i have been relying on my endo to give me samples, b/c the Novolog is so damned expensive. i just received an info card from Liberty (an insurance company that works to provide assistance for pumpers) informing me that since i am on the pump, i can get my insulin through medicare part B. all i need is for my endo to write this info on my perscription. i hope this helps someone else. would love to know of any other "loopholes" you might know about.
Part B Medicare will also cover testing strips if your doctor writes a Rx. I have used it for years, and it sure helps, especially when my regular drugs put me in the “doughnut hole” where I have to pay more for my Rx’s.
medicare does cover my test strips. i get 300 strips a month for $12 and change. thank god for small favors. i could never afford that on my own. (sometimes, when i have a hard month, one w/ illness or crazy ups and downs which require more strips than i have, i do pay out of pocket, but through CVS, i get a substantial discount.phew.)
what strips do you get that they don’t cover? Medicare covers test strips and you need to use the appropriate vendor…in some areas, you have to go with a “competitive bidder”. there is a list of suppliers on the Medicare site.
my endo’s rx is for 300 strips per month (10 per day) and medicare covers that. i am certain that if my endo changed my prescription (i am so lazy that its embarrassing) medicare would cover more strips. i rarely rarely need to POP for extra strips, so i guess thats why i never thought much about it. i use the One Touch Ultra Test Strips. i have an old model meter which i dug up yesterday from my Med supply bag (in the linen closet) and i am quite fond of it; it requires a larger blood drop, but i bleed like a hemophiliac so no worries regarding tough measures getting enough blood out of my finger tip. and i only pay $12 + change for the entire supply of 300 strips. i think thats pretty reasonable.
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Although Medicare does cover insulin under Part B, many seniors have problems finding vendors that will provide this insulin. The problem is that Medicare reimburses Part B insulin at less than cost for providers. Medicare will provide an extensive list of Part B insulin providers and then people call those providers and cannot get insulin.
I called the first provider that Medicare gave me from their list of competitive bidders in my area, and those bozos never returned my call. Pretty flaky operation. turns out I’m able to get my supplies elsewhere. As long as prices are prohibitive I prefer my local target than mail order anyway. It’s been a couple of months, so I don’t recall what item I was trying to get from the outfit that never returns calls.
as you know how rhetorical i can be at times, i call and call and call and bug the living S**t out of the companies. i will wait on line w/ the speaker phone on, and if they hang up/disconnect me (which is all too frequently) i call right back and i complain complain complain. i will speak w/ supervisors, etc. i have no shame whatsoever. Medicare has been good to me on many occasions. Social Security issues are not as easily solved. but i press on; what else is there to do. and, of course, when you “win” a case, its sweet victory. i’ll feel like a million bucks.
Something to keep in mind is that you could probably move to a more current meter which may be more accurate and require less blood at no extra cost. All you would have to do is call a company’s help line and ask them to send you one. Tell them you test up to 10 times a day and it’ll be delivered in a few days.
The BG meter companies make money from selling the strips, not the meters. If a company thinks it has a good chance of getting you to switch to using their meter then they’ll be happy to send you one. At least that has been my experience.
And, yes, you may think you are happy with the older meter and that you don’t care how much blood is required to test. But if you haven’t actually tried anything that is potentially “better”, how do you really know?
Just a suggestion for possible future reference. You seem to be rather focused on finding out what your BG is and, depending on just how old your meter is, a newer model might do a better job of this for you. Or not. But unless you dig into it further, how could you know?
thanks john. great ideas. seeing my endo soon and he has a gah-zillion new meters to give away, especially the new models (he’s been pushing them on me every chance he gets). i think i will take him up on his offers and get a new script for the test strips.
Daisy Mae
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