<p>My D's school has a Health Clinic which is staffed 24/7 by nurses, and also a doctor who maintains a limited number of weekday hours.</p>
<p>At the beginning of our D's freshman year, she developed an acute case of head-to-toe weeping hives, coupled with mild breathing difficulties. She spent several nights in the clinic, with the doctor and I maintaining daily phone contact. The MD wanted D to be seen by a local Dr. and tested for possible autoimmune pathologies. Of course, this option was not provided for under the school's minimal student medical coverage, and such resourses were not available on campus. D had been under the care of an allergy specialist prior to arriving on campus, and had already been diagnosed with a severe allergy to dust mites, which resulted in acute hives outbreaks and occassional breathing difficulties. She had never been tested for any sort of auto-immune disorder. </p>
<p>Our family's HMO severely restricts the conditions under which they will cover treatments obtained away from home. It would have required a written request from her home primary care MD, specifying exact treatments/tests from specifically designated medical offices and/or hospitals. (Mind you, her Primary had never evaluated her for this problem.) The HMO would then evaluate the Primary's request and render a decision, a process which could take several days to a week or more. We could in no way afford to pay the bills this off-policy treatment and evaluation would have incured.</p>
<p>So, to make a long story short, after numerous phone conferences with the clinic MD, we agreed that she would prescribe a prednisone taper for D, which would be filled by a pharmacy in town and billed to us. Thankfully, this worked. However, the whole episode pointed out the difficulties of obtaining routine medical treatment for D away from our HMO's prescribed geographic parameters.</p>
<p>In my opinion, it just shouldn't be so difficult.</p>
<p>A side note to all of this. D's school has a middlin' okay insurance plan that we purchased. But someone in this thread mentioned the secret word and the duck came down: HMO. </p>
<p>For a variety of reasons, we finally switched our base insurance from HMO to a PPO. It's more expensive but we feel it's worth it and getting supplemental coverage for D out of area is <em>much</em> easier. It would have made the physical therapy treatments after she broke her foot a lot less expensive.</p>
<p>Yeah, HMO's suck. My son got a job which gave him an HMO - at the time, he was living at home and so signed up using the home address. His job transferred him to an office in a city about 75 miles away. One day he got sick with a bad earache. He tried calling local doctors, but they said they couldn't accept him -- he had to go his assigned HMO, which of course was near where I live. Finally I told him to go to an emergency room -- he told me had thought of the HMO would charge him $100. I insisted that he go and told him I would pay the $100 -- which of course, I did. But I had to listen to my son rant for a week over how worthless his insurance was. </p>
<p>Here's a contrast: About 20 years ago I got very ill with a high fever while traveling in New Zealand; I had pneumonia. On a Sunday, my husband took me to the nearest public health clinic in downtown Aukland -- I was seen by a doctor after about a 40 minute wait, and promptly prescribed ampicillin. The prescription was filled at a pharmacy adjoining the clinic. I had follow up visits later that week in the doctor's regular office. If I had been a citizen of New Zealand, these services would have been free. Because I was a traveler, I was charged about $70 total (New Zealand dollars -- about $45 US) -for all visits. </p>
<p>The health care system in the US is really sick. There simply is no reason why we should have to jump through such hoops to get basic health care.</p>
<p>CalMom: ain't it the truth. Our system, compared to other industrialized nations, is very expensive and spotty in its delivery. There seems to be a Calvinist underpinning: if you're a deserving person, you'll have enough money to pay for it.</p>
<p>Just a note about acute sinusitus. While I have had sinus infections on and off since I was a young child, I just had a knock-me-off my feet version for the last three weeks. My sympathies for your son. </p>
<p>In terms of treatment, the problem is that antibiotics have minimal efficacy for sinusitus. Check the studies yourself. </p>
<p>Based on this research, I generally have given up on antibiotics and, instead, use saline spray at the first sign of a cold, hoping to flush out the developing infection. </p>
<p>With this last sickness, however, after feeling so, so awful for 10 days, I resorted to a new, extremely expensive antibiotic in the hopes that it would do the trick. Nope it didn't. I was sick as a dog for another 12 days before improving. </p>
<p>One of the problems with having sinusitus while attending college is that it feels like it temporarily reduces IQ by about 30 points for the duration of the illness. Your head feels like it is in a cloud and you can't think. I am sure your son will feel good having his parent come.</p>
<p>We have an 11 bed infirmary on campus, and the infirmary is staffed 24 hours a day by an RN- there are counselors and physicians on call. I really think it's important to have some middle ground between dorm and hospital.</p>
<p>Don't forget dental care too - just got the call from our gal - chipped tooth - need dentist!!!!!!!!! OK - now to find a good dentist from 800 miles away - and make sure insurance works there too - seems never ending lol.</p>