Pain Diary

I am also in the same position, have also been diagnosed with CRPS and also had my DRG surgery denied this week. Here’s what my insurance gave as the reason (I am not making this up!): “Your request tells us you have had back pain (sic) for a long time. Pain can come from both the body and the mind. We need to know that you have seen a psychologist who has determined that your pain is not in your mind”(…etc etc). I am not sure the DRG stimulator is the way I want to go yet, but the letter was very offensive. I got straight on the phone (the inevitable wait just got me madder) and gave the poor gal in the first stage of the appeal an unequivocal piece of my mind. I am demanding a rewritten letter with the CORRECT pain location (doesn’t the doctor read the person’s medical history???) and an apology for the insults and also for the ignorance exhibited by the MD reviewing this. All pain is a perception from the mind,I told the poor gal (who was very kind and professional and said not to worry it was being appealed on Tuesday by my doctor anyway) and how could a psychologist ever say it WASN’T!!! I was told a doctor or nurse would try to call back in an hour (just before Labor Day, so I wasn’t too hopeful, and of course they didn’t call), but I intend to stick to my principles here. I want my record squeaky clean, for many reasons, not the least of which throughtout this now 3 year nightmare I have even restrained myself from crying in doctors’ office for fear someone might see me as anything other than someone who deserves the best medical care there is to give. Of course I cried after I got off the phone, partly because I felt so bad for emoting so someone who has nothing whatsoever to do with this letter 🙁 , or my hernia surgery-related problem for that matter, but also because I have been a customer for many years and I pay insurance dues, and I continue to work to keep my insurance, and here they are cheaping the process for deciding on procedures out to someone who doesn’t even get the correct body part. Wow, keeping fighting for your rights! I intend to do so too! Can your doctor appeal in a peer-to-peer meeting? That’s what mine is doing