[Diabetes-talk] Help with insurance coverage of Prodigy Voice

Fri Dec 26 21:35:56 UTC 2008

Sandy,

The real contact with your legal document of blindness, as Jonathan and 
Cheryl have shared, is to have your doctor notify Home Care as your 
supplier. You need to give to your doctor the Home Care company name and 
their Fax number to verify your blindness. If this could help someone, when 
Tina Rockwell from Advanced Diabetic Solutions, as my supplier, let me know 
she was having a problem getting my doctor to send a document/statement of 
my legal blindness to them, I thought to contact my eye doctor and within 10 
minutes his office validated my blindness and the supplies were immediately 
sent by Tina. My Endocrinologist office staff kept resending my script and 
could not understand what was needed and hanging up my original order.

Best of luck to you and to others. The supplier you choose of the "Prodigy 
Voice" and the "Prodigy Voice Test Strips" is who needs to originally be 
notified of our blindness...

Vincent Chaney
President, Diabetes Division of the National Federation of the Blind of New 
Jersey

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Sandra Murillo" <sandramurillo_580 at yahoo.com>
To: "Diabetes Talk for the Blind" <diabetes-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, December 26, 2008 12:21 PM
Subject: Re: [Diabetes-talk] Help with insurance coverage of Prodigy Voice

Well, I just called BCBS today. Apparently my doctor never notified my 
insurance of my medical need for the prodigy voice. I then called my doctor 
and they said they would fax the referral to my insurance. As for HomeCare, 
I tried calling them but they open til Monday. I'll keep everyone posted.

Sandy

--- On Fri, 12/26/08, Jon Carey <jon at northcoastmed.com> wrote:

From: Jon Carey <jon at northcoastmed.com>
Subject: Re: [Diabetes-talk] Help with insurance coverage of Prodigy Voice
To: "Diabetes Talk for the Blind" <diabetes-talk at nfbnet.org>
Date: Friday, December 26, 2008, 10:43 AM

Cheryl is correct about the letter of legal blindness. We use a
prewritten letter that the Physician must print on their letterhead and
fax back to us after filling it out and signing it. We have not have any
problems billing Insurance companies for Prodigy products, besides the
fact that the Supplier (HomeCare Supply) in this case, should have
verified insurance coverage and discussed with you before sending
supplies!

Best Regards,

Jonathan Carey

Marketing Director

Advanced Diabetes Supply

1-800-730-9887 x 120

1-800-503-6280 Fax

www.NorthCoastMed.com <http://www.northcoastmed.com/>

www.DiabetesHealthSupplies.com <http://www.diabeteshealthsupplies.com/>
Call To Order Diabetic Accessories. 1-866-422-4866

www.GlucosePost.com <http://www.glucosepost.com/>   A Community for
People with Diabetes to Share Stories, Inform, and Support Each Other!

Diabetic Supplies

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-----Original Message-----
From: diabetes-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org
[mailto:diabetes-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of cheryl echevarria
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 5:01 AM
To: sandramurillo_580 at yahoo.com
Cc: diabetes-talk
Subject: Re: [Diabetes-talk] Help with insurrance coverage of Prodigy
Voice

Sandra:

I am also posting this on the diabetic talk site so that way people know
in the future what to look out for being blind and diabetic supplies.

merry christmas sandra and happy new year.

Can you let me know where you know of me I am guess the diabetic talk
list.

I need to know a few things first, what insurance company denied the
claim.  It could be for one of a few reasons why they denied it.

1.  Your insurance company may not have a contract with Homecare supply
company you could have gone out of your network and you may not have out
of network benefits.

If this is the case then HomeCare is at fault.  They should have never
processed the order without verifying with your insurance.

2.  Please let me did you try and contact your insurance company, a lot
of insurance companies especially with diabetic supplies unless you have
a doctor letters stating you are blind accompanying with your order the
insurance companies will not pay.

3. Insurance companies are trained to deny at least 5-10% of all claims
for no apparent reason, that is why the government needs to get there
noses in these business so that they can control what they are doing.

But the funny part is they are also losing money.  As I see in when I
get denials at my job for customers.  at least 20% more patients in
december lost there insurance and have canceled insurance.  Without
customers they will feel the punch themselves sooner or later.

If you get back to me  with some more information as to why they denied
the claim, I cannot do more please do your homework.  And this isn't
over yet you can appeal it.   So do your homework. call on Friday or
monday morning to your insurance company and to Homecare they need to
tell you why it was denied first and then we can go from there.

Take care.

Cheryl Echevarria

Treasurer

National Federation of the Blind Greater Long Island Chapter

Member NAGDU, NYAGDU and DAN

  ----- Original Message ----- 

  From: Sandra Murillo<mailto:sandramurillo_580 at yahoo.com>

  To: cheryl echevarria<mailto:cherylandmaxx at hotmail.com>

  Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 12:01 AM

  Subject: Help with insurrance coverage of Prodigy Voice

        Hello Cheryl

        Sorry for the unfinished message I sent you a few minutes ago. I
am wondering if you might be able to assist me with a snag I ran into
regarding the coverage of the Prodigy Voice Meter and it's supplies. I
ordered the meter and supplies from HomeCare Supply of America in July.
The company took care of everything -- including the insurance paper
work. When I called them to check if my HMO covered the equipment, they
told me that everything would be covered. I got the meter and supplies
for 3 months. When I ran out of strips and lancets, I called HomeCare
Supply of America to order more. During this call I found out that my
insurance had not paied my initial order, and therefore, they could not
send me more supplies. For the past month I have called HomeCare several
times, but each time they are never able to tell me what is going on
with the insurance payment.

        Today I received a letter from my insurance telling me that they
had reviewed my case, and they would not pay this equipment. What can I
do, because I seriously don't understand their decision -- I am totally
blind, and as we know, the Prodigy Voice is one of the few meters I can
use independently. I would have used Medicaid to cover this equipment,
but HomeCare told me they currently don't except it as a form of
coverage. Please help me. Do I need to appeal the decision, or what can
I do?

        Thanks,

        Sandra Murillo

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