Solomom
This has been a long and frustrating journey for me. It began in July 2005. I went to a lap band seminar and was all excited about it just to find out that my insurance did not cover it. Then in January 2006 I decided on the gastric bypass. I was not working and I was on Cobra insurance until Sept. 2006. I went back to the doctor I had seen the previous summer, Dr. Bauman, and we began the process. My biggest concern always was my narcolepsy meds. What use is there being thin if you can not stay awake right. I brought my meds to the visit with me, showed them to Dr. Bauman and he said no problem. In May I'm told my insurance company approved the surgery and I was scheduled for surgery 5/25/2006. On 5/11 I had to meet with Dr. Bauman at 10:00am and the anesthesiologist at 11:30am. Dr. Bauman and I talked for about an hour and towards the end I asked how long I needed to be off my narcolepsy meds. He asked what they were again. Then he said, "You are on Dexedrine for narcolepsy? I assumed it was for weight loss and you would stop taking it after the surgery. We can not proceed with this until I investigate this medication in more detail". With that it was all cancelled. Months of running to doctors and getting doctor's notes and searching for 5 years of weight history...then it was gone. He told me to get a letter from Dr. Tomovich and my sleep doctor indicating they were on board with the surgery. Both had been very compliant with all of his requests so why he wanted the letters was unclear. I got home and called both doctors thinking that if I got the letters quick enough I could keep my 5/25 surgery date. Both doctors had letters back to Dr. Bauman within a few days. When I called Dr. Tomovich I had spoken to her assistant. She asked me why the letter was needed. I said, "I'm really not sure. I've been thinking about it and the only thing that I can think of is maybe Dr. Bauman is concerned that Dr. Tomovich has no other patients who have had the surgery". To which she replied, "She has several patients who have undergone this procedure". "Great! Shouldn't be any problems then" I said. For the next week I called Dr. Bauman daily - nothing. My surgery date came and went. I called, emailed - nothing. My insurance would be running out in a few months so I was desperate. Finally in early July I got a letter from Dr. Bauman saying that I had told Dr. Tomovich that he had called him (keep in mind Dr. Tomovich is female) inexperienced and he was backing out of the surgery because I had lied. WHAT?!?! I was devastated. I fired off an email to him and contacted Dr. Tomovich. He had not even spoken directly to Dr. Tomovich – that is why he did not know she was a female. Someone in his office had spoken to Dr. Tomovich’s assistant and like a bad game of telephone, by the time Dr. Bauman heard it told I had supposedly told Dr. Tomovich that Dr. Bauman was concerned that she was inexperienced. He cancelled based on 4th hand information! I’ll have to finish this long tale at a later date…
OK the rest of the tale. I was devasted and started calling doctors. All wanted me to start the process all over again. Finally I got to Dr. Voellinger. I told them my insurance was endiing as of 10/1/2006. I told them I had all the tests and went to the classes and they said to come in. Needless to say, because of some thyroid issues I did not make the 10/1 cutoff. I was so depressed. I was not working because my narcolepsy was really bad (I was hoping the weightloss would help this). I knew if I did not sell my home I'd end up in foreclosure. Everything pretty much sucked.
I managed to sell my house and now my 4 year old and I have moved into my mother's little condo. Not the best situation but I figure I'd have been staying here anyway until I got better. I managed to get on Medicaid. Not something I thought I'd ever have to do considering I have a college degree. Through Medicaid I'm having my surgery tomorrow, Feb. 12th. My hope is to get my weight back under control which will hopefully help with the narcolepsy and then I want to go back to work. First, I need to get through tomorrow!
