I know it's a long shot, but we're running out of options & my husband desperately needs some diabetic supplies that we can't afford ASAP.
Long story short, he's got Type 1 diabetes (a.k.a. the genetic one some people automatically start suffering during childhood; not the unhealthy lifestyle kind you can get rid of by switching to a healthy diet & exercise).
Anyway he's on Medicaid & very recently his specialty pharmacy that has been sending his supplies via USPS mail for the last 6-7 months is apparently unexpectedly under audit, which they explained means that during this time (with no end in sight) his specialty pharmacy can't ship out any of his medical supplies to him or any other patient they serve. Convenient, right?
Anyway, we can't afford to purchase any of the supplies he uses out of pocket, but he's in some serious medical trouble without these supplies.
I often see very generous & thoughtful people post on here about how they are giving away their old diabetic supplies they no longer need for one reason or another, so I figured it might help for someone who desperately needs these diabetic supplies to try and reach out with an S.O.S. flare. Maybe you are that someone I'm talking about who may just have some of these things we really need right now that are laying around, not being used that they might be willing to donate to my husband.
A little background:
My hubby has Type 1 diabetes & has had since around age 12 as Type 1s do. Anyway, to be perfectly honest he has always resented the fact that basically about the only thing he's ever inherited from his deadbeat completely absent father was his name (he named him Jr. & then bounced out of his life!) and his lovely Type 1 diabetes. His mother was also absent & frankly clueless & wasn't interested in learning about her son's diabetes so i imagine he never really had any guidance from any adult about how to take good care of himself & stay healthy keeping his specialized unique needs as a T1Diabetic.
My point I'm really trying to communicate with you is that he has never been the best at taking good care of himself & his blood sugars.
For the longest time he would only take the same amount of long-acting insulin at bedtime every night, and rarely (if ever) any of the short-acting insulin prior to meals like you're supposed to.
On top of that he also barely ever checked his blood sugars during that time, instead opting to just go off of how he was feeling to guide him. One incident was a day where he was feeling like dirt & swore up & down that he knew his sugar was extremely high & asked me to give him a large number of units in the moment. He was kinda out of it & we had a glucometer handy at the time so I ended up doing a fingerstick on him just to see how high they were before I prepared proper dosage of insulin. Turns out his sugars were actually like 50 & he needed no insulin at all then. Super glad I checked that. Anyway as you can imagine his A1C was thru the ROOF for at least a handful of years up until recently.
About 6 months ago, after YEARS of trying to get on one, his MD finally wrote him a script to get onto a CGM (dexcom g6 & insulin pump (omnipod 5). Yippee, he didn't have to do fingersticks anymore and he still knew what his BG was at basically all times, plus has finally gotten the ability to treat high glucose immediately and without having to poke himself. Great! His A1C? Coming way down to healthy levels, FINALLY, for once after riding around A1C 11 or 12 for several years & being in & out of the hospital frequently for DKA issues.
Ffwd to now. He just was notified by his specialty pharmacy that they can't send out any supplies to anyone until after their audit, if that! Of course when he just found this out at the end of last week, that's when he was on his last omnipod pump (lasts 3 days) and he's currently on his final dexcom sensor right now.
He no longer has any more omnipod pumps, and turns out we can't give him insulin via syringe any longer currently because he's fresh out of those as well & insurance all the sudden says those are no longer covered out of the blue.
We currently can see his blood sugar via his dexcom (he just applied new sensor yesterday) and those are supposed to last 10 days, but that sometimes gets pulled out before then and even if it makes it full 10 days after that he'll be SOL because we have 2 glucometers at the moment. One of which we have test strips for, but it got broken somehow so the screen is no longer visible or readable at all. The other one we can read but he's out of test strips.
Aaah! So stressful. So currently his BG on his dexcom is reading "HIGH" meaning its in the high end outside of the dexcom parameters (which I can't remember if the top number stops at 400 or 500). He is dead to the world other than when he gets up to puke. He's gonna end up in the hospital again today if we can't figure something out. Definitely not anyone's issue but ours, so no rush.
However if anyone knows anyone or is anyone that has any of the following items laying around that they can't or won't use, we would be ever so fatal grateful to be able to take them off your hands:
Needed supplies ASAP:
1) functioning glucometer w/ test strips, or just extra verio brand test strips (we have a finger poker & plenty of lancets)
2) dexcom g6 sensors or transmitters
3) omnipod 5 insulin pump(s)
4) unused sterile insulin syringes (0.5cc-1cc) preferably in unopened packet but we know, beggars can't be choosers
Our one saving grace is that we do have enough of a supply of insulin for now *fingers crossed* so we are currently okay on that.
Again I know this is a long-shot, but we are getting desperate over here & pretty soon (like within the next 12hrs) he's gonna end up in the hospital for several days again if we can't figure anything out. If you can, please help.
Thank you so much in advance.
