Humaniac

Some years ago I was discussing health insurance with my doctor in Florida. At the time I had a choice of insurance policies and the doctor told me to make sure I picked a 'PPO'. So that is what I chose. I was happy enough with that insurance, so when I moved to Chicago I was going to get the same type of insurance coverage. However, for some reason a PPO in Chicago cost two hundred dollars a month more than it did in Florida. I looked at all my choices and saw that something called an HMO was the same price as the PPO I had in Florida, so that is what I signed up for. I have not been happy with it. For some time now I have had the suspicion that there are two levels of heath care. One for the folks who have more expensive insurance, and another for schmucks like me who pick the cheaper brand. Mark has always had great health insurance, Cadillac insurance, top of the line. His doctors always are offering to go above and beyond to care for him.

"Sir, Mr. Mark, we could harvest the parts you need from some homeless person. And don't worry, we will get you the best of medications."

My doctors look at what is wrong with me and seem to want to change the subject.

"Well Alan, that does look a bit painful and I suppose it could be fixed, but it really isn't worth it if you ask me."

Yesterday I got up early and took a shower, paying extra attention to washing my feet. I was going to the podiatrist. Once again I was going to try to get the doctor to do something about my feet. It's getting to the point where I can barely walk and I was hoping to get them fixed. Seriously, at this point I am deemed most likely to inherit my mom's Hoveround chair. Not that I wouldn't enjoy zipping around the house in it, but I do like walking too. So I got all nice and clean, clipped my toenails, put on nice new socks, and left for the doctor's office. I got there thirty minutes early hoping that I might get snuck in ahead of somebody.

"Hello Alan, do you have your new insurance card?"

I did, and I handed it to the nice lady.

"Thank you, and I'll need your referral... "

Well, goddamnedsonofabitch, I forgot. The damned HMO requires you to get permission from your 'Primary Physician' before you can go see a specialist. Like you would just go willy nilly to different doctors because it's so much fun. I immediately called my primary physician's office to ask them to fax the referral over. I got a long winded recording from an automatic answering service, and after hitting #2 for English, #3 for new appointments, and #1 to be transferred to an actual human being, I got an actual human being. She tapped away at the computer for a few moments and then told me that she had sent an urgent text to my doctor's office for them to fax the referral over. I wasn't even talking to somebody from my doctor's office, but instead I got a representative of the HMO. The HMO that I will be dropping next fall when it's time to pick an insurance company for next year. I waited an hour at the podiatrist's office for that fax to come through. It never did.