Last Splash

Thursday, 29 November 2007

Can I tell you how much the healthcare/insurance industry sucks? Now, I could go on a rant about how I understand that unethical doctors and lawyers and the people that go into surgury understanding the risks but still want to sue someone when something goes wrong are what causes the stupid insurance industry to charge out the ass, but I'm not. I'd rather rant about my Dental Insurance, and specifically whether or not I want to pick up COBRA insurance so that my husband and I can get our mouths checked.

So, I called the Dental Insurance company that I have been carrying to ask about the differences in coverage...I figured that I would do some math and figure out if it makes sense to pay the $125 to finish insurance coverage for the year and pay less for our dental appts, or to just scrap it and pay for the dentist out of pocket. (I am a very high-fear dental patient, so the idea of waiting until April or so to have my teeth cleaned instead of going in December is VERY appealing to me anyway.) And they can't give me a number, b/c my dentist (and my husband's) are out of network. They can give me an estimated range of what the average service is in my area, but they cannot tell me what they would actually pay once the paperwork was submitted. I had to tell the lady twice that I was just interested in a cleaning and exam, and she kept saying "but for what type of service?" A CLEANING AND EXAM...DID I STUTTER? And I had to force her to even give me a price. She kept saying "I don't really have that information in front of me." So, I kept saying "can you connect me with someone who does" thinking "because if you don't I'm going to rip my hair out and send it through the phone lines until it comes out on your end and wraps around your neck". Anyway...it just sucks, that's all. Losing my job sucked, too, but not nearly as much as the red tape involved with transferring insurance and deciding what to do with my 401K and on and on.

So, that's my rant today. It probably wasn't all that entertaining, but I really needed to vent because it has not been a great day so far. It's all good, though, b/c I have a buy one get one free buffet coupon for Pizza Inn, and it's date night. Woohoo...