Urgent Help Needed Please

My brother has surgery in March and has a recurrent malignant brain tunor Grade IV.  He has been denied for Avastin/CPT-11 treatment and we have a hearing tomorrow with Blue Cross/Blue Shield. He is progressively getting worse every day and we are looking for facts for tomorrow's hearing. Does anyone know what insurance companies will cover Avastin?  The doctor feels this is his best hope. Please let us know.

 Debbie

 

 

On 7/10/2007 suncat11 wrote:

My brother has surgery in March and has a recurrent malignant brain tunor Grade IV.  He has been denied for Avastin/CPT-11 treatment and we have a hearing tomorrow with Blue Cross/Blue Shield. He is progressively getting worse every day and we are looking for facts for tomorrow's hearing. Does anyone know what insurance companies will cover Avastin?  The doctor feels this is his best hope. Please let us know.

 Debbie

 

Debbie,

I don't know if this helps or not, but when I was uninsured and on chemo last year (FOLFOX), I got one of the drugs (oxalyplatin) for free because I was considered "indigent" - in other words, I'd earned less than $60,000 the previous year. Maybe the drug company that makes Avastin has the same policy. Best of luck with everything.

My husband has stage iv colon cancer and is taking Avastin with oxilaplatin.  Avastin's manufacturer also has a program to replace the drug if the patient has an adjusted gross income of, I think, $75,000 max.  Not sure if that is the right amount.  Our insurance is not paying for any of his treatments but we have not been denied treatment from the hospital giving the treatment.  Of course they are billing us but they have  been working with us to get help.  They are also reducing the charges  We were not eligible for Medicaid but they did recommend that we apply for disability.  He was approved but will not be on Medicare until March 2008--that will definitely help for future treatments.

I found out about the assistance program in a cancer magazine and I asked the hospital financial aid person to help me with getting the drug replaced.  Your doctor should be able to lead you in the right direction or if not, look on the Internet and you should be able to find out the information.

 Good luck with your efforts-the medicine is worth trying and helped to kill almost all the cancer in my husband's tumor and shrunk it over 50%.  They believe that just mainly scar tissue is left.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Debbie. I have been getting Avastin with Taxol for the last 6 weeks. I am on Anthem Blue Cross and it is being covered! I have Breast cancer mets to the liver so maybe that makes a difference but I don't really see why. Hope this helps. Jacquie

try checking manufacturer of drugs website.  they often list programs to help patients unable to afford the drugs.  have also had help from billing department at local hospital when dealing with Mass Health, and they got further in 5 minutes than I could get in a month once my husband was finally accepted on disability (with a year retroactive from my last visit when they insisted he was not eligible in spite of being out of work 6 months).  there's online ordering too.  I ordered 100 generic zofran (drug was manufactured in India by reputable pharmaceutical company) for around $100, and was paying $500 for 15 of them at CVS.  I just researched the various companies before I chose one to deal with.  You just have to get creative with it all.