top of page
  • Writer's pictureRuss Newton

Medical issues, again!


My apparent favorite past time, insurance confusion interfering with treatment and the only solution is for me to call a bunch of people even though I have a great difficulty in speaking and trying to clear it up. So, to set the scene for you all. I drove my cycle to San Antonio to A. see my ALS doctor for a full exam and B. to fly to Cabo San Lucas to go Blue Marlin Fishing. First sign it wasn't going well. I ordered two suitcases for the trip to Cabo since I could very well carry suitcases on my Cycle. Well, Amazon shipped them USPS so even though I was here, they forwarded the suitcases to Wisconsin! So I ordered them again, and this time had them shipped to a friends house here in San Antonio. So the other issue I had to figure out was how to start my next round of treatment of Radakava. I need to start it on the 13th while I am in Cabo so I arranged to have the medicine shipped to Texas. Then I had to follow up today to get an appointment to have a nurse come to my house and access the port by the 10th as I am getting on a plane on the 11th. So I started to worry that no one was calling me to set up an appointment. I emailed the Radakava people for some help but when I didn't hear back from them for several hours I looked up the nursing company and called them. They ended up telling me they couldn't service me because Medicare will not pay for it since I am not housebound. So I suggest they use my United Health Care insurance. They said they could do that because United Health Care makes all claims go through Medicare first. So then I emailed Kabafusion (makers of Radakava) and had a back and fourth dialog several emails long where I had to explain I knew how to do every step of the process except for accessing the port. They wanted to know my travel plans, and where I was going to be. I explained it all. Finally it ended up with an email saying they think they could get a nurse to me by this Friday, the 9th to access my port.


So to review, the company that was accessing my port in Texas from January to May of this year in my home, now can not come to my home because I am on Medicare. And even though nurses can come to my home in Wisconsin under Medicare, I guess it is different in Texas.

66 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

First day of travel.

Headed a little bit out of my way to stop and see an old friend and mentor Gene Bell. We both wore masks and observed safe social distancing and had a nice visit for about 2.5 hours. We caught up on

bottom of page