My blog is 1 year old tomorrow. I just woke up one day and said I want to write a blog. I didn’t know who would ever read it or exactly what I was going to say, I just knew I was going to be honest. I knew I was going to write about my life and struggles with MS, my daughter, dating, and my dogs. So much has changed in the last year since I started writing. My dog…
This was the second most popular blog of the year on http://Www.multipleexperiences.org. I was on Rituxan for over a year and would have preferred to continued however for insurance reasons, I’m changing to Ocrevus. My first infusion is scheduled for August 7th. This blog is just a good inside look at the pharmaceutical world of chronic disease. I decided to go a little honest about our pharmaceutical world of MS. There has been so much press and promise over this new drug…
It was a happy day yesterday, I watched my daughter graduate from high school. It wasn’t held at her school, it was held inside at a theater that holds a good amount of people. Therefore, I was able to have tickets for myself, my mom, stepdad, stepmom, her father, her fathers wife, aunt, step sister and a cousin. They let the graduates have their phones during the ceremony. I text my daughter and asked her to close her eyes for…
I’ve been so involved with the transition to Ocrevus, that I haven’t talked about that I was approved for the nursing aide by my insurance.The evaluator put the request in for 7 days but I really didn’t want an aide 7 days a week. I wouldn’t even know what to do with someone here that many days. My caseworker told me, with the multiple sclerosis diagnosis, it is easy to get the increases if needed. I decided on 3 days a week…
Well, if your following the saga (or catch up with the link above), I discussed my insurance concerns with my doctor with regards to the Rituxan. The Rituxan will come from the patient assistance program at Genentech. However, the infusion of the Rituxan, steroids, benedryl and saline are not covered. My insurance will deny them because they denied Rituxan. I’m scared, at the last minute, they will tell me we couldn’t get authorization for the infusion therefore you can’t do…
So, this is it, the beginning of the weekend. My baby girl graduating high school but it starts tonight with prom. Busy, busy, busy day today. Everything is showered, ok well I’m showered, the daughter is about to. We have a 12:00 appointment for hair and at 1:30 she is in the make up chair. She needs to be at her boyfriend’s house by 2:30. From there they go to the pre-prom party which is 45 minutes away. Unfortunately the…
Continuing my story from yesterday… Two main things happened yesterday. I was informed that I don’t need blood work done. Shocker!!! I’ve been on Rituxan for a year and have had repeated blood work done satisfying the hepatitis pre-check for Ocrevus. HOWEVER, my doctor felt, we were running into a time crunch and I should stay on Rituxan for the July infusion. I knew it!! I purposely came in to see her June 2 to get everything done for the…
OCREVUS (Ocrelizumab) is the new approved drug for the treatment of patients with relapsing or primary progressive forms of multiple sclerosis. I’ve been on Rituxan, the sister drug to Ocrevus, for over a year. The comparison on the drugs is mostly illustrated in my blog post here… I made the error thinking same company, basically same drug, easy transition….NOT!!! Last Friday I found out that my infusion place that I was receiving the Rituxan from, WILL NOT be doing Ocrevus…
I was about to write something else this morning, and then I got a phone call. The call was actually from my insurance company regarding my nursing aide. While on the phone with her she was listening to my dogs bark and started asking me questions. What kind of dogs are they? How old are they? And then she went on to say how she would love to have a dog. Anybody that knows me, knows that my dogs are…
Not too long ago I wrote a post about MS and depression how there is a link. I asked my doctor to go back on Prozac, a drug I was on for over 18 years. I stopped taking Prozac along with a bunch of my other drugs when I stopped working back in January 2016. I was just taking so many pills to get through a day, I thought by not working anymore, I didn’t need them all. Well it’s…
