Insurance Woes..... again

Hello.... its me again....whining about insurance companies. Its not that we don't have good coverage. They pay great - for what they pay for.

You'll remember my issue about them paying for and then not paying for and then paying for and then NOT paying for my gastric bypass. Well, I guess I'm over that. We ended up paying for it and that's that. Its over.

Now, we are in a dispute between the insurance company, us and George Washington Hospital about a bill from December of 2006 !!!! The insurance company sent an Explanation of Benefits (hereafter referred to as EOB) stating that I only owed $1000 some odd dollars. The hospital keeps billing me for $5000 and I won't pay it. I called them and they said they haven't received the EOB. The insurance company says they will fax it to them when the hospital pays back $105 that they were overpaid. The hospital won't pay it back until they get an EOB. Well that's all fine until somebody gets hurt. Guess what. We have been turned into a collection agency THREE TIMES over this issue. I'm just furious!

Today topped it off then. I was referred to another doctor for my throat. Yes - the issue still remains. I can barely breathe. This new doctor is going to put in a stent and he wants to do it next week. It is important. He says it is urgent. The thing is, neither the doctor or the hospital is in our insurance network. Do you think its easy to get them added? If you said yes, then you may think again please. Their office said it is quite a process. I called Jay's office to see if they could lend a hand since his company is self insured. They have somebody to specifically handle this type of problem. She is out of the office all week. She'll be back in on Monday. The bummer is - I've met my deductible so if we can get this done before the end of December, its a good thing. IF we can get them added to the network. If not, once again - its out of our pocket.

I truly do not understand why this must be so difficult. I am very lucky to have health insurance - I know that. Many people don't have it and its really a very unfortunate thing. I shouldn't complain. But, I am. This is nuts.