Put the joint down and check your links. However, the link you provided was very timely and a huge concern for me. I will go on medicare in December. Medicare will only pay for one 30mg sandostatin shot per month. I get two 30mg shots and this increase in dose has had qualitative improvements in morbidity rates of patients. If I go back to one shot, I will be dead in a few months.
Our insurance company just sent us a letter that my shots are approved through next July. So we will be meeting with the teacher retirement benefits people to make sure that the supplemental policy we choose will cover the sandostatin. We have not been able to get a straight answer from anybody, and the folks at Northwestern are pretty sure that a supplemental policy will not cover the shots......so we have the experts at Northwestern saying no, but my wife's initial discussion with our insurance company saying yes if you get the supplemental policy with our company because you are approved through July.
What a mess. The shots are billed at 11k, but you can get them for probably 6k a month or go to Canada and get them for 3k a shot per month. The biggest problem is that people cannot get straight answers from medicare, hospitals, or insurance companies. I have seen grown men almost crying because they are suffering and medicare will not cover the second shot and they know they are dying. I do not know how staff handles these very sad situations. I had one guy asking me how I have been doing on the second shot, and I explained that I have lasted about three years beyond the survival tables with metastasis of the liver, and he has the same and is only getting one shot. It was so uncomfortable to feel his desperation and lack of options. To Northwestern's credit they have a foundation which helps defray costs to patients who cannot afford needed medications, but for all those who think government should not have a role in this mess......they are simply wrong. I get that maybe Medicare should not pay more than one of these expensive shots. Society has to make choices and priorities, but there should be clear rules on supplementary policies, and this is not Donald Trump giving some general blanket statement, but hard....hard.....work drilling down in detail legislation which allows every American to purchase supplemental policies which will cover anything which would have been covered before Medicare eligible patient switches. People just do not understand until a family member is impacted and are marching blindly into the grinder.
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