Can anyone clarify how to properly order pump supplies when you have Medicare? My pump is Medtronic and I order my supplies through them. However, since I have Medicare and a secondary insurance I am told I cannot order through the “automatic shipment” program. At what point is is OK to call Medtronic and order supplies? I’ve had this pump less than one year and it seems that I haven’t been ordering soon enough. I’ve run out of supplies several times and had to ask the Endo for two or three to tide me over. I realize this is not a big issue - but was hoping someone could enlighten me. Thanks for reading.
I could not find it on the CMS site, but according to Edgepark, you can’t have more than 7 days supply on hand. The company I get my test strips from also goes by the 7 day rule. Medtronic might go by something different (but they can’t ship sooner than 7 days). One problem I had with CCS was that they would not ship until day 90 (and for them, it went from calendar day to calendar day and could work out to 92 days).
https://www.edgepark.com/helpfaq/orderingsupplies.cfm#bookmark8
Why can’t I order if I have more than a 7-day supply on hand?
Medicare does not permit us to ship supplies to customers who have more than seven days of supplies on hand. If you added items to you shopping cart, they will still be there the next time you log in to your account, so you will not have to search for them again.
Kelly,
One time when I called the ordering department at Medtronics, the person told me that I should ‘order’ when I had a 30 day supply or less on hand. For some reason I can never seem to time it right and I always end up being short of supplies. It must be my lack of ability to count properly I guess. Sometimes it also takes at least a month or 6 weeks to actually receive my supplies. Forget about calling them early too as they actually ask how many “sets” I have on hand.
Is it Medicare or your secondary insurance that is actually paying for the supplies? If Medicare, I would call them and ask them for details. I have Medicare and I get 90 days of supplies every time. My secondary pays what Medicare doesn’t.
And no offense, but you really need to get a system going to remember when to order. Do you have a calendar that you look at daily? Do you know how to set up a reminder on an online calendar, like google calendar for example?
When you call Medicare, if the first person doesn’t answer your questions, keep calling at different times until you get your answers. This 7 day supply thing does not sound right to me, especially for a pump. I understand why you can’t order from Medtronic but Medicare will have a list of approved supply places and will give you a couple of names. 1-800-MEDICARE
It was pump supplies that CCS made me wait on. The 7 day rule is Medicare however, the suppliers can set rules that are different as long as they are after 7 days, not before.
That sounds like it is a Medtronics issue if they take 4-6 weeks. I remember Doris complaining about them also once for not shipping her order in time. Are you getting sets to change every 2 days or 3? You should also ask your doctor to change the order so you have enough.
When I went on Medicare, Medtronic put me in touch w/ a medical supplier… several are available. And basically when you’re on Medicare and have a pump, your ins. covers all your pump supplies, strips & insulin (assuming you have a secondary insurance as well). Check it out!
IL71 - Medicare does cover the cost of my pump supplies and strips, but not all of the insulin. The nearest ‘supplier’ of insulin in my area is over 100 miles away. Right now we have only one car and my husband is still working, so I have no way to get to the distant city to get the insulin. I’m glad it works well for you though.
At present I’ve waited two weeks for my order from Medtronics because ‘they’ are “waiting” for the signed fax to be returned to them by my Doctor (who has had it sitting on his desk for almost two weeks). I called his office this morning and didn’t get much satisfaction. I will try calling again tomorrow to see if they can get him to expedite it back to Medtronics.