36 E-mail: port removal surgery and insurance error

7/24/2006

SURGERY

This morning, bright and early, Guy took me to the hospital and my breast surgeon removed the port from my left arm. Before surgery the anesthesiologist tried to put the IV in first my left foot and then my right foot. When that didn’t work he gave up and put it in my left hand where I expected it to go initially. The surgery itself was quick – about 15 minutes – and my stay in the recovery room was short. We left and ate breakfast at a new little deli before going home. Then we slept for several hours.

Now it’s evening and my arm finally began hurting maybe a couple of hours ago. I’ve started putting ice on it and taking pain medication so it’s not too bad. Tomorrow I’ll be able to take compression bandage off and resume normal activities. It looks like this week I will finally return to work full time. I’m looking forward to that. My life is slowly returning to normal and that feels good.

INSURANCE

I had an experience today this afternoon I thought might be useful to share. I checked the latest claims online that were processed by my health insurance company. I noticed a $30 copay for my last visit with my oncologist and a separate $30 copay for my last infusion. That didn't make sense since both events occurred on the same day. So I called the claims department and asked about it. Turns out that it was an error. The insurance company had assigned separate copays because they had received the paperwork on different days and didn't realize they were for the combination of oncologist visit followed by infusion.I asked if this had happened before. The claims agent looked back over all 8 of my chemotherapy treatments. Twice before this had happened, so all three mistakes were corrected today and now my insurance company will pay the cancer center $90 that the cancer center had billed to me. I think I missed the first two times the billing mistakes happened because I was too tired or too busy (or too overwhelmed). It's hard to read the fine print when you're feeling wretched from side effects! $90 may be a drop in the bucket of the combined bills, but every little thing that reduces the amount we owe helps. It's hard to find the time, but it pays to question things that don't make sense. I'm so glad that this time it paid off! :-)

PERSPECTIVE

I’ve read that breast cancer tumors double in size roughly every 100 days. I finally got a copy of the full pathology report when I visited my breast surgeon’s office last Friday. My tumor was “at least 3.5 cm” rather than the 2.5 cm I thought it to be. If we hadn’t caught it until Kelric was 3 months old, the tumor would have likely been closer to 7 cm. At 6 months the tumor would have been around 14 cm. That’s huge! And it’s scary. Anything larger than 5 cm is considered to be Stage III breast cancer. Stage III has lower survival rates than Stage II. My cancer was Stage II even at 3.5 cm and I feel even more grateful that we caught it when we did.

Another thing this week that reminded me that things could have been worse is a tragedy that happened to one of my co-workers. Her husband was killed early last week in an auto accident. She has two children under the age of 10 and now her husband is suddenly gone. No chance to say good-bye. No chance to say I love you. Just the sudden ripping feeling of a limb being chopped off.

I like this co-worker and I am so sad for her loss. I am also immensely grateful that I still have my husband. Cancer is scary and treatment is difficult, but at least I have an excellent chance of getting through this diagnosis and living a full and healthy life with my husband at my side. I should get to see our son grow up and enjoy his company when he’s an adult. This has never been a contest of who’s circumstances generated the most pain. Still, knowing that someone I care about has lost a spouse reminds me to keep my cancer in perspective. A Stage II diagnosis is not the end of the world. Compared to losing Guy, chemotherapy was a walk in the park.

Angela

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