doctor Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

April 23

Medicare Advantage

Occasionally, I’ll do a day in the life. I picked April 23 because it was SO all over the place emotionally.

Even when I woke up a few hours after going to bed, it felt weird. I looked at the clock radio, and it was flashing. This meant the power went off, but came on about half an hour ago.

That tracks with the email I got at 12:28 a.m, but did not see until morning. “Dear National Grid Customer,

We detected power outages near [address]. There are currently 1713 other customers also associated with this outage. We are investigating and will provide updates around progress when we get more information. If you are without power, please let us know by reporting it on our website.”

Well, I didn’t get more info, but didn’t need any.

So in the morning, we had to do what we usually do when the clocks change twice a year. The computer clocks are correct, as is the battery-powered analog clock in the kitchen. I have to change the clocks on the stove and microwave.

But much to my surprise, I didn’t have to change the plugged-in “8-inch large clock with day and date for the elderly.” We had purchased it for my MIL for Christmas in 2024, but she didn’t like it. Conversely, I LOVE this thing. Knowing the day, and especially the date, has been a lift ever since I retired.

A certain ‘tude

I was listening to the boom box in my office, but something sounded off. I thought the machine was squealing. No, it was the sound of a bird chirping outside my window! I didn’t see it, but it made me happy.

Eventually, I’m about to take the bus downtown. I wait a few seconds to see if anyone is getting off. I got on, scanned my card, and this dude was just standing there waiting for me to get off the bus so he could get off. What? Someone said, “Next time, you should just USE that cane” that I was carrying. The implication was clear. That seemed extreme.

Then I walked to the next bus. As I walked past a shop, I saw a guy trying to hustle a merchant. The storekeeper said to the other guy, “Let me do you a favor. Get out of my face in the next ten seconds, and I won’t have to give you a lecture.” A “lecture” clearly suggested a thrashing.

What weird energy.

A little more conversation

I get to my doctor’s office early, so I text my daughter to ask if I can call her. (That’s the current protocol, right?) I share that her grandma had been in the hospital briefly, but is now rehabilitating.

She told me that a couple of women at UMass in Amherst were assaulted recently, the latter killed. She found it understandably unsettling, as she goes to that campus periodically, including that day. As it turns out, the woman killed was the wife of the alleged assailant.

I go into the doctor’s office. To get reimbursed for the payment that’s due, I need an itemized statement from the office, which isn’t generated automatically. I suggest printing the bill (which I probably have SOMEWHERE at home), and that does the trick. The receptionist suggests I could do her job, and this becomes her running joke when I later make a new appointment.

Meanwhile, a couple of patients are in the waiting room, railing about Medicare Advantage. I am very interested in the topic, since it will soon involve choices my wife will have to make. One said to “go online,” which I always consider a non-answer. (Still, read this and watch John Oliver.)

The other guy thought it was too limiting and was relieved to get out of his plan, only because his provider had discontinued MA and wanted to put him in a PPO. My doc later said that the MAs are mining patient data and overcharging the government.

The medical aide, who was wearing a New England Patriots sweatshirt but who was otherwise very nice, engaged in some NFL banter with me. She: “You had five years (for the Bills to win the Super Bowl).” Me “Go, Seahawks! “(who beat the Pats in the last Super Bowl.) And “18-1” (Pats were undefeated when they lost the SB to the Giants in the 2007/08 season.) Fun stuff!

Old friend

I got on the bus back to downtown when I saw an old friend. We used to ride the bus together when we both worked in Corporate (frickin’) Woods. She recently retired from her job in insurance; she got a very part-time job at the office of one of her doctors. I don’t think we have seen each other since COVID, which we will rectify.

I went home, took out the trash, and had a quick dinner.

sigh

Taking the 114 bus, I walked north on Willett Street. These two women and their two children were walking south. They must have passed me. A young (20ish?) woman was across the street, in Washington Park, walking in the same direction but slightly behind them, screaming a xenophobic, profanity-laden litany. I stopped and watched her for about four minutes. If she had wanted to get closer to them, she could have. They all got to the corner, turned left, and were out of my sight. I still wonder if I had interceded, if it would have helped or harmed the situation.

I went to choir, and afterward got a ride home.

It was a very rollercoaster kind of day.

My wife could have been a doctor

WellNow

My wife, who has been a teacher and worked in the insurance industry, could have been a doctor. When I got an occasional cut or bruise, she would examine it thoroughly and attend to it with a degree of curiosity that was clinical.

She was so good at this that when my daughter’s college friend suffered an injury, the friend attempted to apply the bandage themselves, but it did not adhere. From watching her mother, my daughter knew how to wash the wound, dry it, apply the ointment on the bandage, and then the bandage to the wound, which stayed in place.

On April 11, my wife tried to squeeze in breakfast with her college friend at a diner before heading to work. Somehow, she gashed her right hand on a picture frame. There was a fair amount of blood for a deep but not too long cut. Yes, she’s had a tetanus shot relatively recently.

She called me to the bathroom. I got the antibacterial soap, she washed the wound, and I dried it. She applied two pads she had left over from her leg injury a year and a half ago. I taped the gauze tightly in two directions.

Will urgent care see her urgently?

She asked me to check the WellNow urgent care website to see if appointments were available at the Western Avenue center outside Albany. The first time listed as available was at 1:20 p.m., about four hours out, but we went anyway.

The protocol was that patients were supposed to scan the QR code inside the entryway. The screen suggested a four-hour wait, but it was less than an hour., a fact I explained to a few other patients when the receptionists were away from the desk. Of course, once my wife was called to see the physician assistant, it was another half-hour.

Still, the verdict is that my wife did not need stitches. The treatment that she had primarily administered herself had done the trick.

I don’t expect my wife to decide to prepare for medical school suddenly, but she could, and she probably would be good at it.

Cash: don’t carry; you need your phone

rejected

My oldest college friend complained on Facebook. “It is almost impossible to use cash in the airport. You’re SUPPOSED to use a QR code to download a Health/Travelers form because there’s No Paper, but you need to sign up for an ACCOUNT to do it!!”

Yes, that was worth at least two exclamation points!!

There are a number of places where cash is no longer king. Getting food on an Amtrak train, for instance. A lot of retailers at markets seem greenback-averse. My running joke at a store register is “Do you still take cash?” Apparently, you CAN accept cash and checks with the service Square. Are businesses required by law to accept cash? It depends on where they are

What countries are going cashless? China’s society is, its central bank is pushing back. Sweden and Zimbabwe, for two, are also getting resistance.

Also, increasingly, I NEED to have a cellphone. When I’m making a medical appointment, I get notices on my phone. When I get there, some places require that I check in via the device. And the photo of my vaccine card is stored therein.

Not covered

Speaking of medical things, I had gone to my doctor in September to get two shots during my annual physical. In October, I received a bill for $125 for services not covered. My physician’s office seemed to think it was because I had received both the flu shot AND the tetanus shot at the same time. But that wasn’t it.

Medicare had rejected the tetanus shot, the representative told me. Now, they would have covered it if I had been bitten by an animal or stepped on a rusty nail, or had another medical necessity. But since I was ONLY getting it because physicians believe I should get one once a decade, Medicare didn’t cover it. And since Medicare rejected it, my Medicare supplement carrier ALSO rejected it.

I’ll have to remember to step on a rusty nail in the fall of 2031.