403 | Score one for the social model of disability

Okay, so. The system that brings me my sleep-hack medication is so convoluted that its inability to reliably deliver treatment for my condition automatically renders any commitment I might make into something tenuous, dependent on numerous circumstances I can't control.

Walking through it...

1) Medication is an absurdly controlled substance; a single remote pharmacy has a legal monopoly to dispense in the U.S..

2) Medication is supplied as a liquid; it is temperature sensitive and cannot be left in a hot delivery vehicle. Therefore, shipment is always "overnight".

3) Only one major carrier in the country is willing to handle liquids of any kind, and it's the one I already disliked due to shitty reliability.

4) Since it's medicine, delivery must be signed for by an adult.

5) Delivery must be to a residential address. The remote pharmacy checks on that every single time I have them ship to someplace new. (They can't ship to my local pharmacy because monopoly. They can't ship to other business locations because "controlled substance" BS, even in the theoretical case that I was the sole proprietor or only person on site.)

6) Insurance won't cover a fill request before day 27 / 30 - in practice it ends up being day 28, because you use the stuff to have normal sleep, and they don't quite account for that.

7) Remote pharmacy operates Mon-Fri. If your normal refill date happens to fall on a Saturday, they won't be able to ship until Monday (day 30/30), which means at best delivery will be Tuesday (31/30), and you spend a day without.

This month is one of those months. :DDDD

The upshot of all this is that every thirty days, my ability to Person is left hanging by a thread, and I'm furious that all the interlocking systems are okay with that.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Date: 2017-07-30 11:05 pm (UTC)

From:

polydad

Renewing contact, hopefully not while asleep

I know you don't like doing voice; can you do text? 541-777-0099, if so.

Date: 2017-08-01 06:17 am (UTC)

403

Re: Renewing contact, hopefully not while asleep

Can do, might have adequate brains in a couple of days.

Date: 2017-07-30 11:08 pm (UTC)

silk_dragon_zen

no subject

Gosh that sounds absolutely awful! 😞

— Sage

Date: 2017-08-01 06:16 am (UTC)

...I'll have a better sense of how awful after a couple nights of real sleep. I shorted two rather than skipping one entirely, and it's hit the point where I'm mostly putting one foot in front of the other without parsing events in depth.

Edited Date: 2017-08-01 06:18 am (UTC)

Date: 2017-07-31 02:27 am (UTC)

chalcedony_starlings

(+) I hope that's not also causing wonky degradation from the “every so often, pile of stress on the system from badsleep”. o..o

Edited Date: 2017-07-31 04:07 am (UTC)

Date: 2017-08-01 06:22 am (UTC)

That angle is kinda indistinguishable from all the other circumstances that occasionally-to-intermittently cause poor sleep? It's not like there aren't a few of those at work simultaneously.

Date: 2017-07-31 03:16 am (UTC)

siderea

Yeah, that's some serious bullshit right there. At this point, I'm wondering if it might not be simpler to learn to synthesize it for yourself. :(

Date: 2017-08-01 05:57 am (UTC)

It's a natural product that can be distilled out of turpentine. No joke. (Though I'd also never want to handle that much turpentine without serious hazmat equipment.)

Right now, the main difficulty in doing anything at all about the problem is my lack of stable housing. Unless a minor miracle happens, I need to spend August gearing up for a return to couch-surfing. Which is the same status that ate 2016, because it's hard to think more than a week ahead if you're not sure where you're going to sleep for the later half of it.

Date: 2017-07-31 03:25 am (UTC)

BTW, Insurance won't cover a fill request before day 27 / 30 is the possibly weak link in this chain. If you are paying premiums unassisted, you might have grounds for a law suit – I wonder if you could intrigue a lawyer into exploring a class-action suit. If you are getting Medicaid money to pay for premiums, your state might well be interested to hear about this. Here in Massachusetts, I would recommend writing a letter explaining all this and sending it to both the state head of Medicaid and the Mass Commission Against Discrimination. You're absolutely right that this is disabling practice, and if you're in a state that takes that seriously, maybe they would step up to end it.

Date: 2017-08-01 06:09 am (UTC)

I'm presently in WA, and that's worth looking into. Also need to see if it's legally specified to the remote pharmacy anywhere, since the degree of "absurdly controlled substance" is kinda extreme. (In the hands of anyone who doesn't have narcolepsy & appropriate prescription, it falls under the same schedule as heroin. There's no political will to change that because there are fewer than 5,000 active prescriptions in the country at any given time - we do not a voting bloc make.)

Edited Date: 2017-08-01 06:40 am (UTC)

Date: 2017-08-01 06:59 am (UTC)

it falls under the same schedule as heroin

Oh, hell. You may be screwed; the 27/30 rule may be legally mandated in that case. Not sure. It would certainly be interesting to find out what the source of each of these policies is.

Date: 2017-08-01 11:34 pm (UTC)

Wow, this bugs me on many levels! I don't see any reason why the Legislature ought to think the med you take need be any more tightly controlled than my prescription of methylphenidate (generic Ritalin).

Just because there aren't as many people with your condition as with ADHD doesn't mean your needs aren't just as important.

— Sage