Getting Insurance Coverage for MS Treatments

I did not know when I headed down the holistic path there would be so many tests. But it seems every new diet I try or symptom I bring up; there is a test for that. These tests don’t carry the $3000 sticker price that more conventional MS therapies do, but a $100 out of pocket here and there adds up, especially when you are not working. So what is a person with MS to do?

Advocate for yourself! Something so simple that I had not thought of in all of my previous interactions with insurance. I was so used to just answering the questions they had, providing the bare minimum. This time when I was checking to see if the Intestinal Permeability and NutraEval tests were covered, I asked, “Does coverage depend on what the tests are for? I have multiple sclerosis and the conventional therapies have not worked for me and were making my symptoms worse. So now I am working with doctors to try and figure out if there is something else going on.” It took them three weeks to deliberate, and two follow-up phone calls from me, but the same woman I spoke to originally called me back. She said many people had input on it, with emails floating back and forth between insurance and nurses, but that the tests would be covered in full. In full! This has never happened to me.

My inspiration to advocate in a polite but persistent way came from the book “How To Be Sick: A Buddhist-Inspired Guide for The Chronically Ill and Their Caregivers” by Toni Bernhard.  Amazing book. This is only one tidbit of insight I have gotten from it so far. If you have allowed your illness to limit the treatment you have sought, feel inspired to get the health access you deserve.

--Emily Royce