The Sewing Mom

This post is for me to let off steam.  If you’ve dealt with health care than you know what I mean.  If not, feel free to skip this and look down to my previous post with a beautiful band photo!

I’ve really come to dread this time of year. Don’t get me wrong, I love the weather, the sights, the sounds, but I dread having to review our employer sponsored health insurance coverage every year! It used to be pretty simple, we rarely ever made changes. But now, I feel like I have to review every little detail to see if we have the right coverage. I’m cringing now because last year I made a mistake when I was choosing from the offered group health plans. Well, I don’t actually think it was my mistake as much as I think it was the employer omitting information.

You see, I have been diagnosed with high cholesterol, something I seem to have inherited. My doctor likes me to have my blood tested every 3 months, which I’ve done for the last couple of years. My doctor doesn’t perform this service in her office, I have to go to a lab with her Dr.’s order. The insurance has always paid for these tests in full. Well, that is until this year. Not until AFTER I had blood work done did I find out that now, lab work performed outside of the doctor’s office is subject to the annual deductible and after the deductible is met, the insurance covers 80%. I have yet to find anyplace in the documentation that the employer sent home that this important piece of information was noted. I am not a happy camper. I am also now sitting and looking at lab bills that I have to pay, including one for an x-ray when my daughter chipped a bone in her finger during softball. Plus, since discovering this, I haven’t been back to have any more blood work done. I’m sure my doctor isn’t happy with me, but I’m not happy with the insurance and will continue to forgo the blood work. My husband had a physical performed by a different doctor who happens to do some lab work in their office, so he didn’t get charged, the insurance covered his blood work. Seriously, I’m going to have to change doctors just to get all this covered! Really ticks me off.

I realize the economy is not good, and I know first hand that my husband’s employer has been suffering due to the economic downturn, but I think they could have kept its employees and families better informed when they were updating their business insurance policy last year. Now it is time for me to review our current plan and they have sent even less information this year than they did last year. It stresses me out to think that with the click of a button, I could potentially be enrolling us in a plan that in the end, will cost us more money and more aggravation. I feel fortunate that we are only having to pay for a few relatively inexpensive lab tests, but it’s maddening when these same lab tests were always covered in previous years.

I do hope that this time, when the employer received their business insurance quote that they better conveyed any changes to the plans to its employees. I guess only time will tell. I called the insurance company yesterday and they said they don’t yet have any information on the plan for 2011, so that was no help at all.

Okay, I’m done venting for now, back to studying the health care plans that are being offered.  I only have a few more days left to finalize my decisions.