INRatio??

[Karlynn]

I just spoke w/ my insurance company (Empire BC/BS) about them paying for repair or replacement of my ProTime 3. This seems too easy, but they said that if having the home monitor was "medically necessary" and I had a Dr.'s Rx, they would pay 90% of EITHER repair or replacement and that it was my choice which I wanted to do. Am I dreaming?

So I'm thinking about replacing my ProTime with the INRatio (would love to do that). Keep fingers crossed for me.

It really does seem surreal. I explained that the battery on my ProTime was going, that the INR #'s were starting to be significantly different and that the makers recommend refurbishing. The lady put me on hold for about a minute, came back and said what I explained above. I asked her several questions just to verify that she was saying what I thought she was saying and then hung up. Seems to good to be true. She even told me to do it before the end of the year because our benefits were changing after the first of the year and this might be affected.

 

[geebee]

Get it in writing!!!!

However, it does sound logical. I have Anthem BC/BS and I did not have any problem with them approving my INRatio. The only issue I had was that they only "allowed" a certain price for the monitor and then paid 80% of that amount. I was charged 20% of the regular price of the monitor when it was shipped to me and had a bit of a struggle to get a refund of the overpayment (my responsibility was 20% of the allowed price, not the regular price). You should watch out for that possibility.

Anyway, it's a fun machine an so very easy to use. Make sure you use capillary tubes with it instead of trying to get a blood drop to go into the well or you will end up with wasted strips.

 

[Natanni]

Insurance

Insurance

Hey Karlynn--

We bought Nathan's INRatio outright with our credit card through QAS. We faxed an itemized receipt to our insurance company, along with the RX from the doc and we received full reimbursement within 3 weeks. I had been prepared for a very long and red tape tangled wait! We couldn't believe our eyes Nathan has Blue Cross Blue Shield CC Systems, through the Teamsters.

We are still trying to work out the getting our strips ordered through insurance but I guess we are suppose to just buy those separate and get reimbursed as well....

Nathan had one bottom low reading that wasn't right, but it was contaminated with alcohol. Every other reading is within .4 of the lab.

Good Luck Karlynn!

 

[CCRN]

INRatio

INRatio

Hi!

I was able to try out the INRatio last week. It was great and so easy to use! However, my joy at having an INR of 2.5 up a week before from 1.8 was short lived. Today the reading was 1.5 and I'm on Lovenox.......oh well, that's for another thread anyway. The pharmasist at the clinic said maybe the INRatio wasn't calibrated appropriately. Anyway, it was really nice and I want one too. The sales rep said there's a program approved by medicare (seems to be the gold standard for insurance these days) that you pay a monthly fee for machine and supplies as well as a number/email address you can use to contact about your levels. Supposed to work with your physician or something. I'm going to find out more in a couple of weeks as I have an appointment with my cardiologist and this rep also said he had spoken with him and received favorable response. You would think the insurance people would love this type of thing as it is much more economical and more preventive of complications.

 

[jeffp]

The lovenox doesn't show up in the testing for INR so that would be expected. Supposedly the INRatio is calibrated by the reagent in each batch of strips, which is why the user needs to verify the strip code before running the test. If the strip code was entered properly, then the reading should be correct within the design of the machine (supposedly +/- 0.3 or 10% -whichever is less according to the manufacturer's represenative when I asked).
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone - I know for sure what I'm thankful for this year (hint - it clicks all day and night)