Gotta LOVE Insurance Companies

Could you "hear" the sarcasm there? What a week, what a week. As if getting ready for surgery wasn't enough, lets throw in some more stress from the insurance company. If you aren't ready for a LONG story, you might want to skip this post.

So I go for all of my pre-ops on Wednesday. Go to the hospital, then to the surgeon. I must say, I LOVE my surgeon!!! And that's about the only reason why I am still having surgery tomorrow. He tells me that him and my OD have decided that I would be better off having lower jaw surgery instead of upper jaw. I had a few concerns, but I trust there decisions, and it's a safer surgery with a quicker recovery, so I'm all for that. I was with my OS for over 2 hours! He was SO complete on telling me everything and answered ALL of my questions. He could tell that I have been doing some research. So thanks everyone!

So I am ready to leave and I am only waiting at the front desk to get the note from the nurse excusing me from work for 2 weeks. After a few minutes of standing there, the receptionist asks me if I am ready to make a payment today. WHAT??? A payment? What for? I have insurance and it's covering it. So I tell her that my insurance is covering this and that I am all set. She goes and checks my records to verify this. Well, if you happen to remember I had a lovely scare at the beginning of the year. My OS use to take my insurance, but at the beginning of the year they decided not to participate with my insurance anymore (and I now see why). But we had it all worked out that they would take what my insurance would still pay them and they would write off the difference. Of course the ladies at the front desk don't remember the whole "we'll just write off the difference". So I call my insurance to see how much they will pay for each of the codes so that I have SOME sort of idea as to how much this will cost me (it wasn't suppose to cost me ANYTHING, which is why I went to this surgeon, but he happens to be the best around, so that's good!)

So I think that I have everything figured out until about 10:00 am on Friday morning. I get a lovely call from Sherry from the OS office. She says "I may have some bad news for you." NOT something you want to hear 3 days before your surgery. She tells me that I don't have "out of network coverage" and that now my insurance is saying that they won't pay ANYTHING!!! Are you kidding me?

So I will try to cut this short, but I was on the phone NON-STOP from 10 until 2 discussing this with the insurance and the OS office. But we FINALLY got it all figured out. And that was ONLY after my Surgeon himself got on the phone with the insurance company. My mother works for a surgeon, and she said that he has NEVER gotten on the phone himself. So that must have pushed things along. The OS office closed at 2, and we had it figured out at 1:45. Lets add a little more stress, right?