Karen's doing well. Really the title of this post should be "potential" good news with a "potential" bombshell.
The good news is we have a tentative date of November 26th for surgery at LIJ. We are "penciled" in for that day. This is further out than we had hoped but we'll take it. My parents have rescheduled their flights to better coincide with the surgery.
The bad news or potential bad news came this evening when I called our insurance company. Long story short it came to light that whilst LIJ hospital is in network, Doctor Ravikumar is not.
This news came despite me checking and double-checking BEFORE our first consultation. After a few phone calls our insurance company located the record of when I spoke to them on August 27th and luckily it contains documentation of the call where I was explicitly told that both LIJ AND Doctor Ravi are IN network. So this proves they screwed up.
Thoughts of switching Doctors at this point are not really an option. We're out of runway and committed to this team. The situation has been escalated to a supervisor and we will hear in a few days whether they're going to cover it. Trust me I will be all over this one.
Obviously the money is not the issue here, we will find it somewhere. Cancer is stressful enough on a family. Despite all precautions on our part, can nothing in this ordeal be simple?
Karen has her 2nd colonoscopy tomorrow to check the status of her primary tumor. Tonight she must drink a full four litres of let's just call it "fluid".
Showing posts with label insurance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label insurance. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Thursday, July 19, 2007
The Cost of Cancer
Karen is doing well, incredibly tired but doing well. She is resting and should be able to get some much needed sleep tomorrow. She has started taking Echinacea and Pomegranate suppliments to aid overall health and build up her immune system. She already takes Omega 3, 6 Fish Oils aswell as Flax Seed, B12 and a multi-vitamin.
When Karen was initially diagnosed we made it a priority that she should receive the absolute best care available regardless of cost.
Medical bills have been trickling in and so tonight I took a look at our insurance claims. So far the amount which has been invoiced for all procedures Karen's received totals $99,738. There's no typo, almost one hundred thousand dollars.
We are going to an in-network team of doctors and hence the actual cost is lower than this due to pre-negotiated rates that our insurance company has set with the doctors. Our insurance company has paid out roughly $44,500, almost forty five thousand dollars.
Keep in mind we have not reached surgery yet.
Bottom line: Cancer treatment is incredibly expensive.
I cannot imagine going through cancer without medical insurance. Thankfully we have insurance, it's expensive but we have it. There are plenty of families that do not. When you're sick the last thing you need to worry about is the cost of treatment.
If you haven't done so recently, I encourage everyone to take a peek at the fine print of your medical coverage. Do you have an out of pocket maximum? Does your insurance have a maximum lifetime benefit? Most plans do and cancer patients can easily exceed the limit. Of course here's hoping you never need it.
I remain confident that we are getting the best treatment available to treat Karen's disease.
When Karen was initially diagnosed we made it a priority that she should receive the absolute best care available regardless of cost.
Medical bills have been trickling in and so tonight I took a look at our insurance claims. So far the amount which has been invoiced for all procedures Karen's received totals $99,738. There's no typo, almost one hundred thousand dollars.
We are going to an in-network team of doctors and hence the actual cost is lower than this due to pre-negotiated rates that our insurance company has set with the doctors. Our insurance company has paid out roughly $44,500, almost forty five thousand dollars.
Keep in mind we have not reached surgery yet.
Bottom line: Cancer treatment is incredibly expensive.
I cannot imagine going through cancer without medical insurance. Thankfully we have insurance, it's expensive but we have it. There are plenty of families that do not. When you're sick the last thing you need to worry about is the cost of treatment.
If you haven't done so recently, I encourage everyone to take a peek at the fine print of your medical coverage. Do you have an out of pocket maximum? Does your insurance have a maximum lifetime benefit? Most plans do and cancer patients can easily exceed the limit. Of course here's hoping you never need it.
I remain confident that we are getting the best treatment available to treat Karen's disease.
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