‘Betes Battles.
“Hi is this Alexis?” says a woman’s voice on the phone.
“Yes it is, can I help you?” I return.
“Yes I’m calling from your mail order pharmacy. Do you use the Freestyle test strips with your OmniPod?”
“Yes. Why?”
“Well they are discontinuing your test strips, so do you have another meter that you can use? I can order you another brand of strips.”
“What? Wait. Hold on. What exactly do you mean? The OmniPod is designed to be used with Freestyle test strips, I find it really hard to believe they’d discontinue the entire line of strips that all the OmniPod customers are using. And I don’t want to have to carry another device to check my blood sugar on when my pump controller already does that. And why didn’t OmniPod call or email about this since it’s their system users that will suffer?”
“I don’t know mam. I’m sorry about this but they are telling us they have discontinued the strips and we should advise customers to order a different brand.”
“Well, please don’t do anything just yet. I’m going to call OmniPod and find out what’s going on” I tell the woman. We hang up and I immediately call OmniPod’s customer service and relate what I was just told by my pharmacy.
The woman at OmniPod tells me that the strips aren’t being discontinued, but because Freestyle released a “next generation” of their regular test strips and those have not been FDA approved yet for use with the OmniPod, technically she wasn’t allowed to tell me it was ok to use the strips, even though they were pretty much the same strips as before.
There’s so many things wrong with this whole situation that I really don’t even know where to begin. OmniPod should have told their customers that the strips were changing and wouldn’t be recommend for use right away because they need FDA approval. I did find the info on their website, but a phone call or email would have been nice since I’m not regular checking their website for fun these days. My pharmacy also should have explained the situation better - what if I hadn’t asked any questions and just accepted what they told me at face value? I’d have gone out and bought another meter and had to carry around yet another bulky item that I don’t actually need.
The bottome line with diabetes is that we always have to be our own best advocates. We must be the ones to stand up for ourselves, ask all the questions, and find out what we need to keep ourselves healthy. The phone call about the strips was just another reminder that there’s a lot of mistakes and misinformation throughout the chain of our healthcare. And if you don’t push for answers and options, you might find yourself without the resources you deserve. It’s total utter and complete BS, but it’s the way it works.
I don’t mind standing up for myself, but I do mind the hours lost on the phone sorting out these diabetes hassles. I mind the fact that an elderly or disadvantaged person might not have been able to get the correct information and it would have cost them money and convenience. I mind that insurance companies don’t understand how complicated diabetes is, and that yes, it is a big deal for something as vital as my test strips to change.
Sometimes, it can be so exhausting sticking up for the ‘betes. But we have to - these are the battles for our own health that we fight every day. Because no one else can do it for us. We have to be the captain of our health team, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, for the rest of our lives. It’s a big job, but someone’s gotta do it.
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Comments
This happens quite often in retail, with no apparent reason or explanation. Suddenly my favorite brand of widget has been “new and improved!” and I have to find a replacement for it. The advantage of retail over medical is that because grocery stores work on such thin margins, most stores are quite happy to bring in a generic brand that is just like the old branded product before they improved it. They recognize their is a need that customers want fulfilled. I wish that medical equipment manufacturers would either allow other manufacturers to fill the gap or have the sense to ask their customers what they think. It’s not like these strips aren’t a cash cow to them!
I think I felt my blood pressure rise while I was reading this blog entry. Something very similar happened to me in December 2010. My pharmacy told me Freestyle had discontinued the test strips that fit my Omnipod. Like you, I made phone calls. First to Freestyle/Abbott, who confirmed the information the pharmacist gave me. I then placed calls to the Omnipod rep in my area, and to my CDE, both of whom made their own calls to try to sort out this rumor. In the end we found that Freestyle had misinformed my pharmacy (and everyone else) about the test strips, and all of the countless calls and time spent trying to sort it out was for nothing. My local Omnipod rep placed a complaint with Freestyle as a result.
To them, it’s a “simple” error they forget about in a New York minute. For us, it threatens our program of care, peace of mind, and adds 5 more things we have to do on our daily diabetic to-do list. I’m sorry you had to experience this, but thank you for blogging about it and bringing it to light.
Hmm. I got a call from Edgepark (where I get my pod supplies) and an email from Omnipod several months ago when the switch happened. Edgepark has been sending me the old strips ever since.
I did do a test between the old and the new, and they were 20-30 points different. Odd, since a lot of other people on the web have reported they don’t see any difference at all. For now, I’m sticking to the old ones, even though I really like the idea of a LOT less blood needed by the new ones.
Hhhm Barbara, I don;t like that the new ones are 20 - 30 off, I will test mine too but that doesn’t sound good. I use CareCentrix for my go-between my insurance and OmniPod, but I’ve not had a lot of good experiences with them - I’ve been thinking about changing to Edgepark for a while now.
We’re on our third batch of 900 new FreeStyle Test strips and really like them.
Several bloggers have written about using them with their OmniPod PDM and even done side by side tests. (This is Caleb and Arden’s Day both have detailed posts.)