[Nichole]

Just an update on what's going on in my little world. Next Monday is my "in person" appeal. I have sat down with a rep from DePuy who will be attending my appeal with me. He is very knowledgable (of course being a sales rep for the Charite he had better be right?) and has informaiton that I had not seen. We are going to try to convince my insurance company that we are not asking them to approve the surgery as a whole....but as a patient by patient basis. I have gathered all of my medical expenses since the date of my injury and will lay those out in a spreadsheet prior to the appeal. This way I can show them how much money they have spent already for my health care and also how much they will continue to pay if the proceed to deny me this surgery. My surgeon will also be attending this appeal with me. As I said in a previous post they only allow us 15 minutes for the appeal but we are definately going to monopolize their time as it is impossible for them to expect us to state what we need to in 15 mintues. It makes me sick that they only allow 15 minutes to me in order to defend why they should be allowing me the health care that I pay for.

Anyway.....please keep me in your prayers as I go through ANOTHER level of appeal.