Pharmaceutical Benefits Management For The Office Of Insurance: Fill & Download for Free

<sigh>Hello, my name is Kristi - and I’m a pot addict. (At least according to the referenced article.)Life before I became a ‘pot addict’:I woke up every morning around 5:30 am to a blaring, obnoxious alarm, drug my 225-pound, obese body out of bed, and took a Celexa for my chronic depression, Levothyroxine for thyroid disorder, and Ritalin to counteract the brain fog of the antidepressant - usually with a 20 oz can of Monster energy drink to attempt to get my head cleared from the bottle of wine I drank over a 10,000 calorie supper with my husband the night before.By 8:00 am, I was usually pulling into the parking lot at my office. As the IT Manager for a large, affluent city, I managed a staff of 6, a 2.1 million dollar budget and all the technical systems required to keep police, fire, and the rest of city functional. The stress was immense, but the pay and benefits were great. I gave back 50% of salary to pay for taxes and health insurance premiums for the long list of medical problems my husband and I dealt with.At 10 am, I was usually on my second Monster energy drink of the day and usually taking my first Ativan to control chronic anxiety from being pulled 10 different directions. I’d take a second by 2 pm and usually another around 6 pm.My husband’s routine was similar, but with a lot more pills. He would take a cocktail of hydrocodone, percoset, and fentanyl for the chronic pain caused by a failed spine. He would take gabapentin for nerve pain, and Flexeril for muscle tension. He also took Xanax twice a day for anxiety, plus Lipitor for cholesterol, and something else for high blood pressure. Additionally, he took 3 metformin each day to control his Type 2 diabetes.Between the two of us, we took 10–20 ibuprofen a day for pain, inflammation, and chronic headaches. Not to mention Benedryl for sinus issues, and cold & flu remedies 2–3 times a year.We’d end our day with another meal which was way too big and probably another bottle of wine.My Life After Becoming a Pot AddictToday, 80 pounds lighter, I wake up naturally, with no alarm necessary, at around 7 am. I am not groggy, I am not tired. I sit up, grab my dab straw and my torch, and I microdose with a sativa cannabis concentrate. Then I go to the kitchen and fix my husband’s breakfast as he eats a half of a cannabis-infused piece of candy fudge.After breakfast is over, my husband and I smoke a joint before I take the dog for a walk. Around 8:30 - I sit in the sun, feed my birds and chipmunks and have what I call my “morning critter meditation” session.At 9:00 am - I will probably microdose with cannabis concentrate again and “commute” about 12 feet to my desk where I make my living as a freelance writer. I’ll write for a couple hours, take a break, probably microdose a little more, grab a bite to eat, go for another walk and go back to work. Rinse and repeat - until it’s time to fix supper.My husband, on the other hand, eats a bite of fudge about every 2 hours throughout the day as he works on our ranch and maintains our AirBnb.So, if ‘daily use’ is considered addiction, then we traded our addiction to disease and pharmaceuticals in for an addiction to cannabis. Now, we no longer require pharmaceuticals for any reason, a single cup of coffee gives me the jitters, and I can’t remember the last time I was drunk.If this is an addiction - then 50% of the American population is “addicted” to pharmaceuticals, social drinking and over the counter drugs.Hello, My name is Kristi and I’ll take my chances with my “pot addiction.” :)

I had a good job but the commute was becoming unbearable. I was payroll manager for 2,000 employees. I saw a job ad for a payroll position not far from my house for a small pharmaceutical company. I applied for the position and was brought in for an interview. I did a well in the interview. It was a small company, only 125 employees, so I figured I was going to be too experienced. They called because my references were dead or they couldn’t locate them. Finally I was able to have a couple people from my old company call them from the home office in France. Two weeks later and call to offer me the position. So I figured how much of a pay cut I could take. I was shocked when they offered me $15k more then I was making. I snapped up the offer. They emailed me the offer along with the benefit package. Four weeks vacation. 100% paid health, dental and vision insurance, 100% match on 401k up to 15%. And it was only 6 miles from my house. I submitted my resignation and two weeks later cleaned out my office ready to start the new job on Monday. Saturday my wife and I drove to New York to see the Rockefeller Center Christmas show. Coming home later that day my van was hit on the NJ turnpike. My van rolled three times. My left arm was almost ripped off and I spent the next 6 months in the hospital. I was never able to go back to work. That was life’s cruel joke on me.

No.There’s no single fix for the U.S. health care system. The system has resulted from decades of government policies, and there’s no simple solution because the problem itself is multifaceted (and different people see different problems!)Volume discounts actually do apply to both medical practices and prescription drugs. Insurers usually negotiate for discounts with medical providers by promising them a certain patient population. (“Give us 20% off your usual rate and we’ll put you on our preferred providers list, and will commit to sending you 500 new patients this year.”) These negotiations are how doctors end up “in network” on insurance plans when they accept the insurer’s rates and other conditions. And the same is true of pharmaceuticals: pharmacy benefits managers negotiate with prescription drug wholesalers and manufacturers, as their patient populations are expected to purchase certain amounts of drugs over the course of the year in return for discounts. (“My 50 million covered lives are expected to buy 10,000 Viagra pills a month in this state alone, so I want your best price.”)While pricing in U.S. health care is indeed, a problem, price variability isn’t the issue. It’s the price level! The prices are too damn high! Requiring insurers to pay the same rate for covered services not only doesn’t change the high price level; it removes yet more market signals from health care. Extend this idea a bit: it’s obviously more expensive to rent medical office space in Manhattan than in Manhattan, KS, and forbidding insurers from varying their rates in accordance with market forces will just distort health care markets even more.