Health Insurance Follies

With impecable timing regarding a possible reform on health care in America, I ended up going to the ER last Sunday morning right before I was suppose to go into work. Thinking my pain was pulmonary related (sharp, stabbing pain in my right chest under my armpit) I wasn't really that worried. I came to find that the nurse that was reviewing my x-ray thought I had some enlargement of the left side of my heart and I was having a mild arrhythmia (ST Elevation to be exact). A shock indeed, but almost right away I really didn't think much of it for some reason. It could have been my faith in that what ever will be will be and my life was in the hands of God (which I was happy with)...or it could have been the fact that I had been working out the past few days in a row all the while reaching my target heart rate with no pain, ill effect, or any suggestion that anything cardiac was wrong with me. After a few hours of hanging out in the ER with a friend (Thanks Thea!), I was discharged with orders for light duty at work and an echocardiogram sometime within the near future. Monday morning it was and the beginnign of my insurance follies. Now, after reading an article about how a girl got sued by her apartment rental company for complaining about mold in her apartment on her Twitter page, I'll with hold the name of the insurance carrier for fear of a law suit for defamation (I know, I must be ill, right?). Throughout the afternoon after I got out of the ER I was trying to prepare myself for whatever tests and appointments I had to schedule (and pay for) considering I was still thinking in the back of my head something may be really wrong with me. My insurance company did not want to pay for the appointment since they believed it to be elective since I was not getting the procedure done in the ER. After and hour of arguing I finally managed to convince them to cover me (which was sad I had to convince them in the first place). Monday morning, when I was sitting in the receptionist's office, she informed me that my insurance company in fact changed their mind when they found out that I was out of state. Needless to say, ferocity ensued. The overall tab for the echocardiogram turned out to be $1100 plus another $400 for a consult later on that week. A day after I had that simple, albeit expensive, 30-minute procedure, I came back to the ER only to find out that nothing was wrong with me and whoever red my x-ray completely misread it. On top of that the degree of ST elevation I had was completely normal for me. I'm still fighting the issue with my insurance company but I am relieved to be in good health. This could, however, end up to be a $1500 check-up for me if I managed to lose this fight. All I gotta say is that Obama, something needs to be done because this is appauling!

A July Synapsis

I've been pretty lazy with my posts for the month of July (as is typical I've noticed for the summer months as far as this blog is concerned) so I figured I'll recap the entire month in one, long-ass entry...

The beginning of this month began with fire. Our first two fires were in Zion National Park. The Woofman fire and the Horse fire both started out pretty small in the first few days of their existence. I never made it to the Horse fire (we were only needed for two days on my days off) but I managed to get a couple operational periods in on the Woofman fire:

From Zion Helitack 2009

From Zion Helitack 2009

A week went by before we went on another fire to the north of us near Richfield, UT called the Amos Canyon Fire. This fire didn't see us do much asides from assist with a couple recons only to leave a few hours after we showed up. We went on our first major fire on 11 July up near Panguitch Lake. The Horse Valley fire proved our longest roll so far. 6 days were spent running the helibase and working on the line combating the tens of spot fires the main fire had caused.

From Zion Helitack 2009

From Zion Helitack 2009

From Zion Helitack 2009

Since then most of our time has been spent running small single-trees that have been struck by lightening and doing some project work around the place. Now, (of course 3 weeks before I drive home) we're definitely starting to pick up a lot of lightening and a lot of local fires...as crazy as it sounds I'm probably going to miss this place when I leave on the 18th...

I've spent a little time here and there getting away from Cedar City. I had my sea kayak shipped out this way so I could use it on the many lakes and reservoirs around this area...primarily Navajo Lake:

From Cedar City

From Cedar City

From Cedar City

From Cedar City

I've managed to get out for a few local climbs but nothing in the park this month. With me being the states for the rest of the winter, I'm really not too worried about trying to get as much climbing as I can in the summer...

Asides from all of that, I've been trying to trade in the Xterra for an older model Ford pick up...like a 1996 F-250 or something like that. Despite being away in the winters for the past two years, I've driven the shit out of that car over the past 5 years and it has held up pretty well but I'm looking for some thing that will hold up for a few hundred thousand miles versus what a gas engine will. I dunno. I have 3 weeks to pull it off...hopefully I'll be driving home in something different than what I have now...

I think that sums up the month of July so far...