Preliminary investigations into the new healthcare system in California
Well, I was all about to write a whiny post about how much the "Covered California" plans were going to cost me and how much they wouldn't cover when I went back to check the exact numbers and found that I had somehow been directed to the wrong chart yesterday. Maybe. It looks like the new plan is actually going to work for me.
Currently my doctor and my pharmacy have been giving me hefty "uninsured discounts" and my medicine is actually costing me a wee bit less than it did when I was insured (not my doctor visits, though: they're almost three times as much, but still less than they could be). But according to this chart and the calculator on the site, I'd be paying about $75 a month for coverage, and then well less than I'm paying now for medicine and very much less for doctor visits than I paid before when I had insurance. Which is cool. I'm not one of those people who hangs around endlessly bugging their doctors, but I would like to be able to go in an discuss the complex of ongoing issues I have on a more regular basis. And maybe address with him a couple of them that I've just tended to grit my teeth or apply home care to because the big ones demand our attention.
I don't see any reference to dental or vision on there, though, and that's unfortunate, because teeth are such a vulnerable space -- you get mouth infections and they go to your heart, and that's not good. Also, glasses and quality of life, you know. (on that front, I've applied to the Lions club for vision subsidy, and I'm sure I qualify, but the big question is do they pay for the kind of glasses I need -- trifocals, continuous blend, and a prism? That's a pretty expensive ticket right there. My frames are good, but I've rarely been able to reuse them because they keep changing the shapes of the lens blanks so much that you just can't match them)
On another front, I am making oxtail and beef shank stew with plum wine and the usual vegetables and herbs. I used to eat a lot of oxtail when it was cheap. It was cheap this time, I don't know why.
And can I brag about my daughter? She's spying on penguins for the aquarium these days, that and scrubbing shit off rocks and tallying fish. But it's what she's always wanted to do, and the fact that she can do this now is a step closer to her being able to do it for a living.
Currently my doctor and my pharmacy have been giving me hefty "uninsured discounts" and my medicine is actually costing me a wee bit less than it did when I was insured (not my doctor visits, though: they're almost three times as much, but still less than they could be). But according to this chart and the calculator on the site, I'd be paying about $75 a month for coverage, and then well less than I'm paying now for medicine and very much less for doctor visits than I paid before when I had insurance. Which is cool. I'm not one of those people who hangs around endlessly bugging their doctors, but I would like to be able to go in an discuss the complex of ongoing issues I have on a more regular basis. And maybe address with him a couple of them that I've just tended to grit my teeth or apply home care to because the big ones demand our attention.
I don't see any reference to dental or vision on there, though, and that's unfortunate, because teeth are such a vulnerable space -- you get mouth infections and they go to your heart, and that's not good. Also, glasses and quality of life, you know. (on that front, I've applied to the Lions club for vision subsidy, and I'm sure I qualify, but the big question is do they pay for the kind of glasses I need -- trifocals, continuous blend, and a prism? That's a pretty expensive ticket right there. My frames are good, but I've rarely been able to reuse them because they keep changing the shapes of the lens blanks so much that you just can't match them)
On another front, I am making oxtail and beef shank stew with plum wine and the usual vegetables and herbs. I used to eat a lot of oxtail when it was cheap. It was cheap this time, I don't know why.
And can I brag about my daughter? She's spying on penguins for the aquarium these days, that and scrubbing shit off rocks and tallying fish. But it's what she's always wanted to do, and the fact that she can do this now is a step closer to her being able to do it for a living.