Angry, angry, angry!!!

I got finished with my insurance requirements on October 4th and called my patient advocate to let her know I was done. A week went by and I never heard anything, so I called back and she said it would be sent for dr approval and they'd call me when it was sent to insurance. Never heard anything so I card my patient advocate again, to find out that it had already been sent to insurance on October 18th. I thought "great! This may happen sooner than I expected!" So I called my insurance company to make sure there's nothing they need from me (okay, maybe I secretly just wanted them to say, "oh, it's already approved and we will be notifying your doctor soon", but the news I got was NOT what I wanted to hear. She said they hadn't even gotten my claim from my doctors office!!! I just called my dr again and was told to leave a message with the office manager, so I'm going to try to refrain from being nasty, but I'm just so peeved right now! I wanted to get this done by the end of the year and be ready to start classes again at the beginning of January. I'm not really feeling very hopeful at this point

If your doctor's office said that they sent it, they probably did. Insurance companies' "phone answerers" are notorious for being uninformed and not having a clue whether things have been received. I'm sure things will go through the proper channels and you'll hear soon!! Best of luck!

I agree with Chrissy.... The insurance company can have your emotions a wreck. They told me they never received my weigh****chers information but they DID. Then they DENIED me at first because supposedly weigh****chers was no longer accepted when it WAS.

Agree with both of these ladies. Don't be hard on the dr. office. Insurance is THE worst. I was told my approval was pending a lack of information that we'd already sent and I had 45 days to submit that info. Six days later (39 days shy of 45) I was denied for not submitting proper documentation...and at that point it had been submitted twice.

This is a process full of hoops. Just jump them. It makes the end result that much more sweet.

The doctors office called me back and gave me the claim number from when they sent in the paperwork. I thought about just leaving it alone and hoping that everything was done correctly, but I called the insurance company back and they said that the claim number I gave was just requesting approval of the inpatient stay afterwards, but for the surgery itself they should have sent in pre-determination information as well. So I don't even know what this all means, I just hope it gets straightened out soon.

And I understand what you said about the phone answerers at the ins company. The second time I called, she tried to tell me that my policy doesn't even cover WLS..... Sheesh.

AS Someone who deals with Dr's offices and insurance companies all day long for a living, let me give you advice, you have to treat them like they're two year Olds. Unless the staff nurses at the drs really care and are good with what they do they may not have sent it. Just keep doing what you're doing. Stay on top of the Dr and stay on top of your insurance Co and call EVERY DAY til you get the answer. Don't worry about being a pest or whatever cuz remember, they work for you. Without you as a patient they wouldn't be in business. And, in the process, i know it's hard but just try to stay calm and don't even worry about the"if's." Know your going to get the right answer and soon. It may sound stupid butwhen i went through all this from day 1 i approached it with the attitude and mind set of "this surgery is going to happen. I'm going to get it done. All this is just a formality" and you know what, by having that attitude i had the smoothest ride ever with the doctors, insurance, all if it. It was a piece of sugar free low carb cake Don't drive yourself nuts.

Thanks for putting some perspective on it. At first I felt bad for calling to bother them, but now that I see that it may have helped prevent a further delay, I'm glad I called!

I wouldn't be so hard on my doctors office unless they had already shown that they don't call back. There have been 4 times that I've called my advocate and she hasn't bothered to call me back. What if the insurance company had tried to call because they need more info and she can't call them back either?!