5. Pre-Surgery

My surgery was scheduled on a Thursday.  The Tuesday prior is when i scheduled the medical equipment people to come out to my home and give me the items my doctor ordered.

He ordered:  Crutches, CPM machine (continuous passive motion), a "game ready" cold water therapy machine, and a hip brace.  The doctor told me that generally insurance won't cover the cold water therapy machine.  When the equipment company called the first time, I asked them the same question and they said sometimes insurance won't cover it but they would let me know.  So the day before my appointment to have the equipment dropped off I called my insurance company.  They said everything was approved except the Water Therapy machine.  They also warned me that some companies may get "shady" when dropping off the items...

So they arrived and as the woman was setting up the cold water machine I asked her if Insurance had agreed to cover everything.  She said that they should because they said that they would.  I then said, "Good, I just wanted to make sure that I would not be paying anything."  She said, "Well they said they should, but worse case we would give you at the patient cost of $325."  I thought this was very shady indeed.  That being said, I anticipate paying the $325 because i'd rather have the machine than not, but I will give it a slight fight when the bill comes (since my paperwork said patient responsibility was $0.)  But that will be when the time comes, for now, i'm glad I have it.  This water therapy machine (Cothera V Pulse) is also a Compression machine to prevent blood clots from sitting around so long, so I'm very glad I have it..... (and while writing this the day after surgery, I'M SUPER GLAD I HAVE IT!!!!)

She set up the CPM machine which was pretty simple.  The water machine has 3 wraps.  One for my hip which has water and air, and one for each calf with only air.  (Air = compression).  While i have help at home, when she was putting all this stuff on me, all i could think was, "There is no way in hell I will be able to do all this after surgery."  It wasn't that it was difficult, just that I would have to bending down and I thought I wouldn't be able to bend at all... (now, after the surgery, if I had to do it myself I could, but until I HAVE TO do it alone, i'll use my helpers!)