She literally called me at the time of the appointment to tell me she can’t see me. She was so apologetic, but was like “I absolutely can treat you, but I’m not allowed by your insurance”. Fuck this country.

Update: I went to urgent care. Before leaving home, I called to be sure they would accept my insurance (Aetna). They said yes… After arriving for my appointment, they told me they do not accept my insurance. I will simply leave without paying.

Final Update: I can understand that that differences in physical biology demand different attention. That’s not what I’m complaining about. It’s the way it’s set up. I was told that at my appointment. Why not just refer me to a specialist? The website could’ve even just referred me to urgent care (yes, my insurance requires a primary care physician’s referral for urgent care, according to the urgent care facility). But, no, their goal is to obfuscate and irritate until the patient gives you and pays out-of-pocket.

I was able to receive care at a cost I could not afford. I won’t discuss what I had to do to “find” the money to pay for care and prescriptions. That being said, the condition I was diagnosed with was more serious than a simple infection, and I’m glad that I saw a doctor. I need further treatment and just hope I can get insurance to cover any of it.

If you’re an American reading this, please consider ways to get involved in organizing in support of Medicare For All in your community. Here is one resource I have found. We don’t need to live like this. We deserve better. Stay safe and healthy, friends.

  • guyman@lemmy.worldEnglish
    101·
    1 year ago

    Sounds like discrimination based on sex. A clear violation of the Civil Rights act of 1964.

    • Landrin201@lemmy.mlEnglish
      2·
      1 year ago

      Car insurance companies are literally allowed to discriminate by sex and will openly tell you that they do so, why would health insurance be different?

      • UniquesNotUseful@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits different treatment of insured persons on the basis of their sex in connection with pension funds. This was a supreme court ruling, so kind of linked but not quite.

        https://www.jstor.org/stable/253100

        Interestingly, in UK and EU it became illegal to discriminate by sex for car insurance from about 2012, without very careful use of data - which doesn’t happen. It is allowed to be linked on things like jobs though.

        • STUPIDVIPGUY@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          1 year ago

          newsflash: US never cared about civil rights and despite it being “law” it gets regularly ignored on an institutional scale

    • average650@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      It might be, but some health related coverage is legitimately divided along sex lines. I don’t know what the answer is, but it might not be so simple.

      Stupid either way though.

  • spaghettiwestern@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    A lesson I learned the hard way is the only way you can tell what your insurance actually covers is to read the fine print. The insurance company service reps can’t be relied upon and the medical office reps just make up an answer if they don’t know. Nor can you be sure the coverage statement from the insurance company is right wen they finally send it. That’s wrong a significant percent of the time too.

  • salt@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    Are you sure this isn’t just a CVS thing? It says the same thing for me and I know my insurance covers UTIs for everyone. Maybe try an urgent care?

    • DRx@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      1 year ago

      This is correct… there is 2 things to remember here

      1. CVS only has nurse practitioners, nurses, or pharmacists that are doing the screening, and must refer for certain cases
      2. There are 2 types of UTIs….
      • complicated and uncomplicated
      • Men ALWAYS have a complicated uti due to the anatomy of where the uti is located
      • women can have either, these NPs are only allowed to treat UNCOMPLICATED UTIS and must refer all complicated cases to a physician.

      FYI it has nothing to do with insurance

  • Sans_outside@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    Should have just said that you identify as a woman, probably solved. /S

    But in all seriousness that’s just terrible. Everyone no matter if your a man or woman should be treated equally.

  • smokinjoe@kbin.social
    1·
    1 year ago

    I think most everyone knows this would have to be in the USA.

    Sorry OP, I really hope those greedy assholes just made some shitty mistake.

  • iceycake@lemmy.mlEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Have you try other online services (no insurance need) like GoodRX care? I don’t see you need 16 or older for UTI in their options.

  • tigaente@feddit.deEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    That’s disgusting if you ask me.

    Also, you have to be 18+ for getting a contraception appointment. I guess teens in the US are also having sex like teens in other parts of the world and would very much need access to contraceptives, right?

  • justhach@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    The entirely of modern America could be summarized with “Mildly Infiruating”, tbh.

    It is utterly baffling to me how the US has not figured out nationalized healthcare. Literally every other developped nation in the western hemisphere has at this point.

    A politician could come out and say “my number one priority is to ensure that every American has access to healthcare, paid for by the state”, and would instantly be villified by like half the country, and that’s insane.

  • Uriel-238@lemmy.fmhy.mlEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    I can’t help but wonder what happens to girls 15 and under when they get UTIs. Insurance company says sucks to be a girl?

    • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Probably.

      We knowingly vote for this shitty health care system every two years, so why would they ever change?

      • Uriel-238@lemmy.fmhy.mlEnglish
        0·
        1 year ago

        At the federal and state levels, we knowingly vote against King Heron so he doesn’t eat all the frogs. (That is, we vote against Republicans who are actively working to neuter democracy).

        Getting social safety net stuff, justice reform or even election reform will require grassroots pressure bigger than yhe George Floyd / BLM protests.

        And without those things, instead were going to get genocide politics and civil war.

        • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          1 year ago

          I think we convince ourselves we’re voting the way we do for good reasons, but since Reagan, our votes have resulted in conservative outcomes no matter who we elect. Obama even had a supermajority for six months of his presidency, and we still had to hear the usual excuses people make in order to deflect from criticism of Democrats.

          I say this as someone who voted Biden fully expecting him to govern as a conservative because I thought we needed a cultural victory against the resurgence of fascism. And, even with the 1/6 domestic terrorist event, we haven’t seen any real movement to stop those elements. If anything, they’ve grown stronger.

          I agree with your main point though, meaningful change is impossible now. It would take an existential threat greater than COVID for it to happen, and in a country where 40,000,000 people can’t afford to miss a day of work, it’s just impossible.

  • porkins@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    You are presuming that it is a UTI and and coding it wrong for insurance purposes. Do a visit for something more generalized that is covered like abdominal pain and doctor will know how to code it properly for insurance.