Life with a Fractured Humerus: Why the US Healthcare System is Broken

After many months of waiting, and waiting, sometimes not so patiently, waiting;

On June 1st I received the much coveted plastic card that says I was deemed insurable and worthy of healthcare.

It took a long time to get here mind you. I have been trying to be deemed insured in some form or fashion without completely committing perjury of falsifying records since I first broke my arm in October of 2007.

My crimes that have deemed me uninsurable have consisted of:

  • Not having a super corporate job and daring to work at a four star restaurant that just did not have any healthcare options
  • Having a husband that was self employed and we not having a certified accountant to prove his income
  • Not being poor enough..should just NOT work at all I guess!
  • Not being an addict or someone who was on public assistance
  • And of course, there was no Obamacare at this time!

This year our W2’s were pathetic enough that NY State said “yes, you are eligible!”….. in February.

In March, hopeful that the end was maybe near, I made the appointment with the New doctor.
I was not going to go back to the old one who:
1) did not reset my arm properly when I clearly had reinjured it in week 2 of the initial injury
2) Was all for operating until they heard “no insurance”
3) Ignored me and Rye multiple times when we said it wasn’t healing
4) didn’t even SEE me until March of 2008 when his “bone setter” finally gave in and admitted that it wasn’t quite healing. He was rathe shocked that I could not lift my arm.
5) Sent me home to not come in for 120 days after giving me some bone simulating machine, that did not work, and then.. sending my account to collections since I hadn’t been in to see, and pay, him
6) refused to see me after sending my account to collections even though I was having radial nerve pain.

Nope, I was done with him!

Now mind you, my MIL broke her same arm and went to the new doctor who had previously been recommended to me, so I was all please to go to the new doctor. She had told him about my story and how I was waiting for the insurance card and it was lovely to hear him say ”I want to see her now anyway”

Well, The doctor might have wanted to see me, but his office chick would have none of it and bared me from the April 13th appointment unless I could fork over the self payment of $200.

I figured, heck.. I had waited this long.. after all the October 2007 break was now on 1 and a half years of living with a fractured humerus.. so why should I be out 200 bucks when all I have to do is wait for cards right? They will be here soon…

So I waited.. I waited all May for my cards and then, cancelled and rescheduled my May 29th appointment made a new one for today.. and promptly got my cards on June 1st. Figures!
Long awaited, my doctor’s appointment was today, but then there had to be a hitch.

I had to have a referral from my primary care physician.

Now, being uninsured as long as I have, I don’t have a primary care physician. I did, but really, I was ready to change for someone more local anyway. So I didn’t mind that the magic insurance card had some Dr’s Name on it that I had no clue of. I called.. both Rye and I need full physicals, etc. ..I am willing and ready to go for a full check up, but in the meantime, can you give me a referral for my arm?

No. They will not give me a referral until I see them and, here’s the kicker. They are not taking new patients until August. Nice. So I make my August 24th appointments and call up the Insurance gods.

What can I do, I ask them? My PCP that you gave me will not give me a referral and I have been waiting to go see the Arm doctor for months.

They say that they might be able to work it out with the arm doctor, but I know better. I was not going to go to the office and be held off in the waiting room again. I mean, I know I will just lose it and cry right then and there, so I call them first.

And after getting lost on hold and going in circles and getting cut off.. I find Bev who now knows my story and Kelly.. who gets it and says that they can wave a referral at times and they could do it for me! Yeah.

And then, noooo.. the Insurance gods will no longer allow the doctors that power or control or doctor like decision making regarding people’s health.

Mind you.. I am at work doing all this. So I think.. Ok I will go down the list on the website of all the doctors in my area and at least ONE Of them might be human enough to realize I am not asking for a refill of codeine, but that I HAVE HAD A BROKEN HUMEROS SINCE OCTOBER OF 2007 and it might be the HUMAN and decent thing to GIVE ME A REFERRAL.

But, it’s 12:30 and all the doctors’ offices are all on.. lunch break.

I lose it. I can’t bear the thought of canceling yet another appointment. I stand up crying, in my office, and declare that I am going to the ER and will say “My arm hurts, I can’t move it.. oh, it’s broke? Really.. good I just happen to have a doctor’s appointment at an ortho in 4 minutes; GIVE ME A REFERRAL!” I walk home.. I cry the whole way. I am going to lose my shit.

Really ENOUGH. FIX MY ARM!

 

broken left humerusOk.. so I don’t go to the ER.. my MIL pulls some strings and I go with her and we see them anyway.

Guess what? My arms broken. It’s a really bad break. It has not healed. I have two bones where you all have one. They float about.. they click togther…I make people woozy.It’s truly like a second elbow. I should have had surgery back in November of 2007. Imagine that. I need serious surgery now and it still might not heal up, but.. with the bone grafts that they will take from my hip and the steel plate holding my bones together, I should be ok. But I have to see the head of the practice first.. on July 30th..as he does big operations like mine more often.

Oh and I still need to hunt up that referral from some primary care physician.

So I go home and I start calling all the doctors who are no longer on their lunch breaks and I find out that the NY plan that I am on.. it’s the ONLY one that still requires a referral. Oh and a lot of doctors on the list, well they don’t take it anymore. But I try calling anyway. So optimistic still for reaching a human being. It actually eventually happens…four calls later. After being told maybe a doctor will take me.. maybe. And then another had to send me paperwork first and then they would give me an appointment but it takes two to three weeks..then I get a woman who says..
“Oh.. do you have a problem?”
“Yes. My arm is broken.”
“Do you have pain?”
“Yes, it hurts.”
“So you need to be seen because you have a problem and need to be seen right away by the doctor?”
I get where she is going with this.. oh yeah.. I need to be seen right way!
OK, I didn’t take the July 3rd appointment this week because we are going camping.. but I took the one for Monday morning! I have NO IDEA who this doctor is but I don’t care. I have an appointment in 7 days.

I still don’t know if Monday will be good enough for the bone doctors and the insurance company.. it’s a week later, but I will call them tomorrow and see. I have little choice really. I might still get billed for this…though I am insured.

All I can say to all those people who are against nationalized healthcare because it takes away the consumer choice of which doctor to go to.. all those people who say that its socialism and American’s don’t want it… all those people who say that Canada’s healthcare system sucks.. I say to you: Screw YOU!

You try living with a broken arm for 21 months and then no one will give you a referral and the insurance gods want you to pay even though you are covered but god forbid they actually help you!

I can tell you it sucks.

The only good news about today is that the good doctor did say that they will make the one incision behind my tattoo.. so my ink won’t get messed up.
In the meantime..

I’m still waiting. Broke arm and all.

About the Author

Claudia Corrigan DArcy
Claudia Corrigan D’Arcy has been online and involved in the adoption community since early in 2001. Blogging since 2005, her website Musings of the Lame has become a much needed road map for many mothers who relinquished, adoptees who long to be heard, and adoptive parents who seek understanding. She is also an activist and avid supporter of Adoptee Rights and fights for nationwide birth certificate access for all adoptees with the Adoptee Rights Coalition. Besides here on Musings of the Lame, her writings on adoption issue have been published in The New York Times, BlogHer, Divine Caroline, Adoption Today Magazine, Adoption Constellation Magazine, Adopt-a-tude.com, Lost Mothers, Grown in my Heart, Adoption Voice Magazine, and many others. She has been interviewed by Dan Rather, Montel Williams and appeared on Huffington Post regarding adoption as well as presented at various adoption conferences, other radio and print interviews over the years. She resides in New York’s Hudson Valley with her husband, Rye, children, and various pets.

7 Comments on "Life with a Fractured Humerus: Why the US Healthcare System is Broken"

  1. Oh my gosh… I’m so sorry. It sounds so painful.

  2. Wow…..that’s all I can say! It’s amazing that you made it 21 months with that break!! Good luck with your doctors visit this week and I pray that you your arm will be healed up soon

  3. It really is quite is barbaric that you have had to put up with this.
    I hope you soon get the care you need and that your arm will heal OK.

  4. The big scare-campaign in Washington against a Canadian-style system raises the spectre of “waiting lists” to scare people. Well, frankly, all the UNINSURED people in the U.S. are on an INDEFINITE HUGE WAITING LIST that goes on forever with no hope of treatment. And the Canadian government is working on reducing waiting lists.

    Here in Canada, I don’t have to wait to see my G.P. I get to choose whatever G.P. I want. A G.P. can recommend a specialist, but I have a choice, and the G.P. *will* refer me to the specialist of my choice. I can look up waiting times on the internet for specific doctors, hospitals, and procedures and base my choice of specialists or hospitals on that. PLUS our medical insurance program covers ALL doctors and hospitals in not only the province we pay premiums in but also all other provinces by interprovincial agreements. I can go to any neighbourhood walk-in clinic and see a doctor at any time without making an appointment — it is all covered.

    Anyone who is against a Canadian-style system is simply fear-mongering.

  5. You should submit this to a medical and/or insurance journal.

  6. Jesus, Claud, you STILL have that break!!!!! I am stunned. It is barbaric that you have had to endure this. I am horrified.

    It is really sad that in the most prosperous country on earth, we who, for whatever reason, have lost our insurance’s best hope if we get a serious illness is that it is something that will kill us quickly and with as little pain as possible.

    Last week I was at the VA with my husband doing a follow up to surgery that they did on him. Obama was on CNN discussing the health package. Some old fart was sitting there, at the VA, where he is treated for free or little cost to himself, and commenting on how this was going to bankrupt the country, we were going to go bellyup, and I kept thinking how ironic that he was denying others the exact same thing that HE was using.

    Good luck to you, Claud. I hope that this all works out okay for you.

  7. I feel your pain. I just had surgery to correct a non-union of my humerus.My arm was broken two years ago and still would not heal. I have insurance and my husband is a doctor. I was able to be seen by a teaching hospital in El Paso Texas by a man the other ortho doc’s call the ortho god. He was excellent. I had a to be referred and there was a long waiting list.two months to be exact. I didn’t care all I wanted was my arm to be healed and well. Surgery was done in June As soon as I woke up from surgery I was out of pain and I knew on my way to recovery. I had to have a plate inserted my radial nerve was moved around. The surgery was complicated and I have a huge scar on the back of my arm. I don’t care.. my arm is going to get well. I will get about 95 percent movement and strength back Hang in there… better you get the right doctor to take care of you.

    You are correct about national care. We fight with medicaid and medicare about payments and treatments. One of my husband specialities is breast cancer. He had done surgery to help the patient recover because he knew it was the right treatment to wellness. It. was a decision that needed to be made there in the OR. Payment denied because he didn’t get pre-approval on a condition that could not be detected until surgery. We wrote off the expense.
    I could fill up pages and pages of stupiidity mandated by goverment My favorite is when Medicaid patients don’t show up for surgery or just decide the don’t want surgery while they are waiting to go into surgery.
    Paying customers like you and me would be dragged over the coals by the insurance company but not medicaid. They are not held responsible for ANY OF THEIR ACTIONS. This does not just happen with our practice but everyday at the hospital. The cost is huge. Those are spots that could have been taken by really sick people. Also the cost to buy anesthesia, surgical trays, hiring nurses and techs all gone to waste.
    I called and was told there was not a thing I could do because it’s the “government.” When someone pays for their own insurance they really think twice about going to the emergency room. But not the people on Medicaid. They don’t pay co-pays or have multiple doctor bills etc etc. So they go to the emergency room at night for what reason .. they r not working????. So what would be a $80 visit turns into a $1000 dollar cost to government, The US taxpayer. Okay I got it off my chest. I wish you wellness and a speedy recovery.

Comments are closed.