<p>I’ve been to several appointments with my father lately. Frequently the doctor will say stuff about a bunch of conditions and then prescribe a bunch of medications. I can’t keep them straight and quite honestly I’ve seen the pharmacy screw up on how frequently the medications need to be taken and when.</p>
<p>I have a hard time keeping the medications straight too. My sister in law set the drugs up on a piece of paper that kind of resembled a clock…so a person would know what time to take each drug. </p>
<p>Doesn’t mean the drugs are going to be taken at the right time. Just improves the odds.</p>
<p>My desk drawer is filled with prescriptions for my sons, all sorts of psychiatric meds. The doctor changes the dosages every couple of weeks. I have to split pills, and remember things like, “1 mg in the morning, 2 mg in the afternoon, and 2 mg at night.” And that’s just one of the meds. I have pill boxes, but the 16-year-old is not good about remembering what to take, so I have to remind him. I don’t see how the doctor keeps track of what’s going on. What do patients who don’t have support do?? This is stretching ME!</p>
<p>I have 4 Rxs, and several supplements. Because two of the meds are taken twice a day, and because of what can or cannot be taken with other meds and/or food, I have 4 pill-taking events per day. There’s no possible way I could keep track of this every day. Enter the humble pill-minder – best thing since sliced bread!</p>
<p>LasMa…do you have a link so we can see the humble pill minder?</p>
<p>Another issue associated with elderly patients is sometimes I get the feeling that a lot of doctors think that because somebody is old, why bother? I’m hoping this isn’t the case with a geriatric doctor that I’m going to start taking my father to. I would expect that they are more diligent when it comes to health concerns of the elderly.</p>
<p>dstark, here’s a sampling. Some of them are dirt-cheap as you can see. I go for the $2 ones; I figure they work just as well as the $12 ones. </p>
<p>[Pill</a> Organizer Products from PillThing.com](<a href=“http://www.pillthing.com/categories/pill-organizers]Pill”>http://www.pillthing.com/categories/pill-organizers)</p>
<p>I have 4 of them, one for each event and I keep them in the logical place according to the time of day. So the morning pill minder lives in the bathroom so I remember to take it when I first wake up, the dinnertime pill minder lives on the kitchen counter, and so on.</p>
<p>LasMa…I like these. I am going to bring this up with my folks. Thanks.</p>
<p>@jym - Didn’t see your earlier comment to me. My concern about Medigap and all of Medicare is that it is so hard to decipher. </p>
<p>For those who think regular insurance is a quandry, just wait! </p>
<p>I capitalize to emphasize, not to shout. </p>
<p>I find negative comments about people receiving Social Security and Medicare
beyond annoying, since I consider the comments untrue and I’m sick of hearing them. </p>
<p>I’ve also had a particularly annoying year dealing with insurance re to a knee injury and my husband becoming Medicare eligible, so in any discussion of insurance I am sure to sound unreasonable. :)</p>
<p>parent1986,
If you didn’t see my post to you (from several days ago) how did you know I had posted to you in the first place?
I posted #332 and 338 in response to your post #330. Is that what you are asking?</p>
<p>By the way, I find these digital pill dispensers with alarms very useful for those who may forget to take their pills, or forget if they have taken them [Emergency</a> Medical ID & Medication Management Products for Peace of Mind - Pill Organizers, Portable Medication Kits, Digital Pill Containers, Watches with Alarms,SOS ID Jewelry](<a href=“http://www.bindependent.com/hompg/bi/bindep/store/aisles/gaincontrol/medmanageprod/medmanage2.htm]Emergency”>http://www.bindependent.com/hompg/bi/bindep/store/aisles/gaincontrol/medmanageprod/medmanage2.htm)</p>
<p>As an aside, who is making any negative comments about people on medicare or SSDI (disability)? Could you point that out? Don’t seem to see it. Nor do I see where someone is insidiously posting and then retracting some personal agenda. Where is this stuff???</p>
<p>dstark: I have a couple of questions for you about Serencsa.</p>
<p>A month ago or so, we got our annual increase letter from Anthem (13%). The Serencsa Open Enrollment for this cycle was given as April 30. We’ve been talking with our broker, and were planning to make the change next week.</p>
<p>Today, we got another letter from Anthem saying that “We are writing to let you know that the premium rate shown in that [earlier] letter may have changed to a lower amount.” And indeed, the new letter says that the increase will be only 11.8%. And the Serensca Open Enrollment has been changed to May 30. I know they have to establish open enrollment any time they change rates, so I guess I understand why there’s a new, or different, deadline. </p>
<p>Did you get a second letter? Anthem does not lower premiums, EVER, not even by a little bit. Heck, the original 13% increase was well below average. Do you know why they’re suddenly being generous? It’s so out of character that I feel like there must be something up, especially with the changing deadline.</p>
<p>This settlement is our only hope of affordable insurance for our pre-Medicare years, especially if the Supreme Court strikes down Affordable Care. I just feel like Anthem is being tricky in some way that I can’t see, and the trick is to get us to unintentionally forfeit the benefit. I don’t trust Anthem one little bit, and this shifting-deadline business has me nervous.</p>
<p>Anthem is not being generous.</p>
<p>Anthem raises both premiums and the cost of actual coverage.</p>
<p>Medical costs are not going up 11 percent a year. </p>
<p>I received my letter…and no…my premium increases are not going to be 25 or 30%…</p>
<p>The increases are going to be a little over 19 percent.</p>
<p>I am changing my plan.</p>
<p>I am trying to ignore what Anthem writes because I think Anthem doesn’t want us to move. </p>
<p>No guarantees that the switch will be beneficial either.</p>
<p>I am going to save between 5,000 and 7500 initially (pre-tax) by switching and then we will see what happens…</p>
<p>Looks to me like most of the plans have cost increases of 10 to 20 percent.</p>
<p>LasMa…I just talked to Anthem…</p>
<p>And I don’t feel good about anything the company says. </p>
<p>The company says the new plans are going to go up quite a bit in cost if Obama’s healthcare plan passes through the Supreme Court.</p>
<p>He says all the kidney dialysis people are going to be left and the healthy people are going to flee…to cheaper plans…And I am going to be stuck with the kidney dialysis people. </p>
<p>I said I already am. :)</p>
<p>dstark:</p>
<p>If the ACA is upheld, won’t you then be able to drop Anthem and join the state exchange? </p>
<p>btw: I switched our company from Anthem this year. Even after showing them a couple of other quotes from national carriers, they wouldn’t budge on their double-digit increase. We ended up with better benies and lower cost, this year. (Hopefully, the new carrier wasn’t giving us a loss-leader price to get the biz…)</p>
<p>Bluebayou…I haven’t looked at the exchange yet.</p>
<p>After I hung up with Anthem…it crossed my mind that Anthem was threatening to do in the future what they did in the past…which is lock people into policies. This led to a class action suit againat Anthem and the reason why I can switch now.</p>
<p>Good luck on your move.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>surprise surprise…what a garbage piece of legislation</p>
<p>dStark – Did he really say kidney dialysis patients? Patients on kidney dialysis are eligible for coverage under Medicare after a short waiting period regardless of their age, and that has been true for many years. If this was his example, he’s not precisely the guy I’d trust on the information front.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m envious. We’ve wanted to leave Anthem for years, but we have pre-existing conditions. </p>
<p>As dstark says, under this settlement, this is our one chance to get better coverage for a lower price. But it took a court ruling to force Anthem to do it.</p>
<p>Arabrab…I think the guy did…</p>
<p>I had a better guy on the phone last time.</p>
<p>Last time…the guy on the phone said…of course you should switch… :)</p>