Did you read my last post about my imminent kidney surgery? If not you can read it here: it explains what’s been happening so far.
Basically my left kidney has dropped and isn’t working as well as it should and I have what is called Nephroptosis or Floating Kidney. When I’m laying down in bed it floats back up to it’s ‘normal’ position, but as much as I would love to spend all day in bed, I do like to have some kind of life. Some of the symptoms I have to deal with on a daily basis include diarrhea from my kidney leaning on my pelvis and bowel, severe waves of pain, constant kidney pain, light headedness, pulsations in my kidney, bladder pain from kinks and twists in the slack arteries, constant UTI’s. I’m not going to go on an on you get the picture.
Below is the image of my actual kidneys the picture on the left was taken when I was horizontal, the right was taken upright. You can see how my left kidney drops significantly on the right.
I started paying health insurance in July last year and I was diagnosed with Nephroptosis in October. My insurance claimed they would cover hospitalization and operations after 6 months, so in February (this month) I went to see my Kidney specialist and said let’s do this. I’m sick of taking pain medicine, anti-diarrhea tablets and walking round like a 90 yr old, when in fact I’m in my early 30’s don’t smoke or drink and not extremely overweight.
The Dr printed out the papers and told me to just confirm with the insurance company. Expecting an easy ‘yes’ let’s sort out the papers, you can imagine my devastation when they turned round and said no, you are not eligible for this surgery. They are claiming that I knew I had this illness before I took out my insurance which I DID NOT!
The surgery I need called a Nephropexy will be laporascopic and my kidney will be lifted back up into place and stitched in with a special mesh. The Dr wants me to stay in the hospital for 5 days because of the nature of the operation, obviously gravity plays a big part in this and they want me to stay in bed for the first days after having this done, so the kidney can start to naturally attach itself.
The hospital themselves have been fantastic it’s just the insurance company I’m VERY disappointed in – I need to come up with 5,200 euros to pay for my hospital bill before I can have my surgery on Monday 17th not only have I been stressed about having surgery but also worrying about money. (Family have come through and helped us, after the bank refused our application for a small loan, they are all being very supportive – so lucky!) <3 Have you had similar problems with insurance or health care?