OK, it’s been a little over three months since all this started, and it’s pretty much done.
Right foot still hurts sometimes, but that’s just because something like that takes a while to get completely back to normal. The area is still a little pink and swollen, but it isn’t an open wound. Looks like I have a scar, but it isn’t all that grotesque from what I can see.
I’m not limping nearly as much any more, and most of that is due to the neuropathy making the other ankle hurt after a long day at work.
I haven’t sat down with all my bills and added them up, but all told I think the total pre-insurance bill is right around $45,000-46,000. It was around $34,000 for the hostibule, doctor’s visits, and post-hostibule wound care and big clompy boot. Then tack on about four grand and change ($220/visit, about 20 visits) for the nurses coming out every few days to make sure nothing was going horribly wrong and change the wound-vac dressings. And another six or seven grand for the wound-vac itself.
I’m paying just shy of three grand out of pocket and I’m getting everything else medical-related for free the rest of the year, including prescriptions, because I went way over my yearly out of pocket.
So after a few months I still have my foot and all my toes, I don’t have much ongoing pain from it, and I paid less than ten percent of what I would have had to without insurance. Plus I have some pretty nasty pictures to show people.
Not bad considering a guy at work told me his reaction to the first wound pic (the one with exposed tendon) was “his shit’s comin’ off.”
I’ll take it.