I know I am a little late here. I have to admit - sadly - that I didn't even realize it was National Infertility Awareness week until the week was almost over. I have read many posts by my friends here on the web, but I was hesitant to post anything of my own. I hadn't made a video that touched the heart and I hadn't done anything special to prepare for it. I didn't feel like I had any thoughts eloquent enough to be shared.
Then I woke up this morning with my own NIAW thought and I wanted to share it with all of you. (Had I been in tune with NIAW earlier in the week, perhaps I could have actually posted this prior to the week ending. :o) )
We were one of the lucky ones who had Infertility Coverage in our health insurance. Believe me, I completely consider us 100% lucky that we had this coverage. Otherwise, we would have been having to decide whether to blow our savings on IVF or to put it towards adoption. Looking back, I am so thankful that we had this coverage. Had we not had it, we would still be exactly where we are today, only with our savings drained and our nursery still empty.
I understand the fact that insurance companies set ceilings on the amount of coverage they will provide. However, the ceiling for infertility coverage? It is typically not that high. Ours was a max payout of $25,000 in a lifetime. Have you priced IVF lately? Even at the agreed upon insurance rates, these treatments are NOT cheap. We were able to squeeze out 2 fresh cycles and 1 frozen cycle at these agreed upon rates and we still have a small amount of coverage left - but not enough for a cycle - so we have practically exhausted our coverage. Isn't that like telling a cancer patient that you can only cover 3 rounds of chemo? Do they limit the number of times they will treat you if you cut off your finger? Or the number of babies you can deliver under their coverage? Or how about the number of times they will pump your stomach if you OD? They WHY do they limit the number of times you can try for a family with ART at such a low amount?
In addition to this, during our first IVF cycle - as you all know by now - we had fragmentation of our embryos. This indicated that genetically something was not right. Some research quickly led me to the realization that our Infertility insurance coverage did not cover ANY donor cycles. I was completely amazed by this. How was that fair at all? If our gametes weren't acceptable, then we were SOL, even though we had insurance coverage. Infertility is a disease - just like any other disease. Doesn't our health insurance cover heart transplants? Kidney transplants? Blood Infusions? Aren't all of THESE considered donor procedures? Why would donor eggs or donor sperm be any different? Donor embryo cycles are not covered either, just in case you were wondering.
WHAT IF insurance companies were required to offer Infertility Coverage? And not only that, but WHAT IF insurance companies were required to provide an acceptable ceiling of coverage? And WHAT IF they were required to cover donor cycles?
There you have it - my contribution to NIAW.
2 comments:
I have had these same thoughts so many times. It is so frustrating to me and the sad thing is you had much more coverage than most women do in the US but it was still crappy. It's a major issue and one that I hope is eventually resolved. There are so many wonderful couples out there that would make amazing parents especially you and Derek. It makes me sad to live in a world where you have to be rich or willing to go into a huge amount of debt to conceive if you have issues with fertility, when the abortions are covered right and left. It's a messed up world we live in.
I don't think it's sad that you didn't realize it was NIAW... it shows you aren't letting IF be a major focus in your life right now, and that's a GOOD thing.
What's sad is the lack of decent coverage, like you talk about.
If we didn't have to pay for everything out of pocket, we would be able to afford the childcare location we think would be best for our children. We wouldn't be using generic formula and I wouldn't be going back to work in two weeks- I'd be going back in August. So even though we were lucky, we are still feeling the effects of the 20,000+ we spent to get lucky. We paid the last installment of our IVF bill last week. That's how lack of coverage is still affecting us.
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