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Upgrading My Healthcare Experience – DBlogWeek Day 4

I think that I may spend more time on the phone with my insurance company throughout the year than I do speaking with my healthcare team.

Go back and re-read that.

This is coming from someone who gets a good 30-45 minute discussion with my educator at every single visit (I see an ARNP not endo).

That would be very high on my list of things to change. That the insurance companies actually read the notes from the previous callers because every single time I have to explain the situation and that’s when my frustration levels begin to rise.

Another issue I would like to see fixed is that when I actually pay for health insurance, that they provide some sort of prescription co-pay. Currently, I had to change to a temporary plan due to a marketplace hiccup, if you will. With this new plan, there is no prescription coverage, basically I pay whatever the pharmacy discount is. So for my 6 vials of Novolog (or Humalog or Apidra, doesn’t matter) it will cost me just under $1,000 and that includes the co-pay assistance from Novolog. Just last month on my previous plan, it was a $25 co-pay.

I’m sure this is one is going to be listed on everybody’s post today – Choice.

I think that one explains itself.

I cannot complain against my medical visits because I get a good 30-45 minutes and it’s an actual discussion back and forth with my educator. We figure out what went wrong, what worked, and make a plan for the next 90 days before we regroup again.

I know that is not always the case, so I would like to see that my doctor be able to get paid for the time that they put in. A lot of education is missed out because they don’t get reimbursed for it, and that doesn’t help anybody.

I would also like to not have to hear stories anymore from people that say, “what?? You’re doctor emails back and forth with you??!!??”

Yes, I will email her and say, hey I just uploaded 7 days of sensor data, can you take a look and she will respond with what she thinks.

Now, do I think that she should be able to bill for that? I don’t know. Here’s why..

I own a business and sometimes I have to do work in order to either gain a client or keep a client that is work, but not billable work, it’s relationship building work. And that is how I see these emails.

But, I would like to see the healthcare system have a way for doctors to get paid and reimbursed for Skype calls and it not have multiple hoops to jump through.

My primary issue is just a simple customer service one when it comes to insurance. Just simply have great customer service and a great customer relationship management system and don’t be another roadblock in my life for better health.