Dear Fresenius, I HATE you (long rant) and: this has GOT to be a HIPAA violation

[Desert Dancer]

So every month Fresenius does SOMETHING to piss me off royally. I can't tell you how much I hate that company. If they run their clinics like they run their supply side it's a wonder they're still in business.

Dear Fresenius:

First, the bloodlines. They used to be looped up inside the packaging and secured with plain paper tabs, easily removed. Now: you've replaced the plain paper tabs with numbered adhesive tabs. Impossible to remove and the adhesive sticks to EVERYTHING, making it a fantastic magnet for dirt, dust and contaminants. Thanks! Not to mention that I haven't talked to anyone yet who pays the least bit of attention to your idiotic numbering. Honestly, if someone has to go by numbers to set up the bloodlines, I don't want them setting up the bloodlines and do you really think a home patient needs to be walked through how to set them up? Really? Also, you used to package both the arterial and venous bloodlines in ONE plastic bag. Now: the venous bloodlines have their own special, separate plastic bag inside the original plastic bag. Great! Just what the world needs, more plastic bags. Way to go with the environmental sensitivity, as if dialysis isn't wasteful enough as it is.

Next, the needle sets. The original needle sets came in a pack of two: one pack contained both the arterial (with a green clamp) and a venous (with a yellow clamp). Now: one needle per pack (MORE packaging), and they all have yellow clamps. Thanks, Fresenius! Now if I wake up bleary-eyed to some middle-of-the-night emergency, I'll need to spend precious seconds trying to figure out which line is which since I can no longer tell just by glancing at the clamps. Oh, and those clamps? THEY LEAK BY. I'll be backcharging you for the case of Resolve I have to buy to get the bloodstains out of the carpet caused by your cost-cutting measures. Leaking clamps, yeah, there's no liability issue there. Short-sighted bastards.

While we're on the subject of your cheap-assed needle sets, I should tell you they are so poorly designed that I can no longer see the flash. Luckily I'm at the point now where I can feel my way in, but I'm not always certain and used to rely on the flash for confirmation. No more! Now I get to back out the needle and see whether or not I bleed all over the place to be certain I've hit the door into my fistula. I also used to rely on the bevel of the needle to know when to lower my angle, but thanks to you I've had to rejigger that guideline because the damned bevels are longer than the old ones. Anything to make my life easier, right, Fresenius?

Oh, and here's a tip from a former purchasing coordinator: when YOU change suppliers on YOUR end, and YOU change item numbers on YOUR end, you don't get to tell me I no longer have a prescription for needle sets. That is, if you HAD told me anything at all and hadn't just let me languish, wondering why you weren't sending my needles two months in a row. Turns out you didn't bother to tell the clinics, either... apparently it was a great big secret. Here's a tip: the commonly accepted - and common sense - way this is handled is to migrate the old item numbers to the new ones and then TELL SOMEONE. Here, I'll even help you out on this. "Dear Clinic, this is the old item number, this is the new item number. Please advise your patients to use the new item number when ordering. Sincerely, Fresenius." Two whole sentences! And you could even use the savings from your purchase of cheap-assed needle sets to cover the postage and still have some left over!

This month you've really pissed me off. Not as much as you pissed me off with the whole "let's change item numbers, not tell anyone, and refuse to send necessary supplies to anyone using old item numbers" bit, but still - pissed off. To my delight, however, it seems you may have crossed a legal line this time. Seems that - beginning this month -you've decided to slap a label on each and every box of supplies you send. Labels that have my FULL NAME and ADDRESS, my DOCTOR'S NAME, my RX NUMBER and a FULL DESCRIPTION of the prescription (HEMODIALYSIS CONCENTRATE! NEEDLE SETS FOR DIALYSIS!)

I am a home patient PRIMARILY because I am a private person and don't want my medical business broadcast to the world. If I really wanted everyone to know my medical business, I would go in-center and walk there three times a week with a sandwich board that said "MY NAME IS X.X. MY ADDRESS IS X.X. and I AM A DIALYSIS PATIENT." Now, this may come as a surprise to you, but those boxes go out into the world. Luckily my husband is able to use them for shipping at work, otherwise we'd have to camp out on our lawn and give up the house to the umpteen boxes I receive every month. That means that anyone and everyone who gets one of these boxes knows that MY NAME IS X.X. MY ADDRESS IS X.X. and I AM A DIALYSIS PATIENT. That means you are broadcasting my medical information to the world at large, to perfect strangers. I'm pretty sure this is a HIPAA violation and as soon as I can track down the relevant statute I am going to nail you on this. Finally, I will get some satisfaction. I hope you get fined. I hope it's a LARGE fine. I hope it's a fine PER BOX. I think I'll save mine, just in case.

Love,
X.X.

(Sorry for the length of this rant, I just had to get it off my chest. Anyone know who to contact re: HIPAA violations?)

[fearless]

Wow, i support your rant.  Having had issues of my own with Fresenius AND Baxter, I am familiar with your anger and frustration.
Regarding the boxes: i was on PD for eight years and suffered the insult of thousands of boxes with all my information plastered on them being delivered over the years.  However, they were delivered by Baxter directly to my home, and I tore off each and every label before I recycled them.

What bothered me was: i used to see other people's names on supplies at the clinic.  i guess they used individual accounts to order supplies that ended up being used for teaching or supplying new patients here and there.   What's up with that?

But I'm especially concerned about your complaints regarding the home hemo supplies because i will soon be entering into that realm myself and truly don't like the sound of the sub-par tubing, needles, etc.  What the h*ll?

[Desert Dancer]

It really pisses me off because they have a captive market and can basically do whatever the f&@k they want. Where are you gonna go?

Admittedly some of my complaints are really just annoyances, but when you stack one annoyance on top of the other it can really be infuriating.

It does bother me about the bloodlines, though; the old ones were obviously much better quality and the only reason they switched HAD to be for cost because the new ones are obviously cheap. It sucks to have to be nervous about your equipment.

Yeah, I could just peel the labels off... in theory, anyway, if they hadn't been steamrolled on. There's no way in hell I should have to spend hours either picking off labels piece by tiny piece - or sitting there with a box of Sharpies - to protect my privacy. This should be common sense.

[jeannea]

Intersting problem. The labels on the boxes never bothered me. (I'm on PD and get Baxter supplies.) i tell lots of people I'm on dialysis. But I can see how some people wouldn't want to. However, I suspect the labels are not a HIPPA violation. (disclaimer I am not a lawyer) think of it this way. When you pick up your blood pressure meds from the pharmacy, the label has your name, address, doc name, and info on the drug. The boxes for dialysis are considered the same. They are medical supplies prescribed for you.

But you should not be getting crappy supplies. That sucks.

[Desert Dancer]

Intersting problem. The labels on the boxes never bothered me. (I'm on PD and get Baxter supplies.) i tell lots of people I'm on dialysis. But I can see how some people wouldn't want to. However, I suspect the labels are not a HIPPA violation. (disclaimer I am not a lawyer) think of it this way. When you pick up your blood pressure meds from the pharmacy, the label has your name, address, doc name, and info on the drug. The boxes for dialysis are considered the same. They are medical supplies prescribed for you.

Quite true. However, I don't take my empty prescription bottles and mail them off to random people around the country. Nor do I take and display them in my front yard. What's interesting is that it seems to be an entirely voluntary thing, as this is the first month they've appeared. If it were akin to a prescription bottle - required - they'd have been there from the get go.

Unfortunately, I'm beginning to suspect they're not HIPAA, either, though I may still try to file a complaint anyway.

[sullidog]

I like the company so far. I am in center and they seem to run it pretty good, but I know clinics have also complained about the leaking clamps so you're not alone there.

[willowtreewren]

Desert, I find it VERY confusing about you blood lines. That is one thing that NxStage really does right. The Arterial line clamp is RED and the Venous line clamp is BLUE. Makes perfect sense, huh?

And the needles come in a two-pack. Once when they were out of the two packs, I got single packs, and the clamps were white. I had to be extra cautious with determining which was which. I feel for you.

 

Aleta

[Desert Dancer]

Another thing I forgot to mention is that the needle sets come with picks for removing your scabs. The old picks were great, tapered down to a really fine point so you could get under the scab and lift them off. With the new ones I might just as well try to pick my scabs with a wooden block; there's no taper at all. I had to save picks from my old ones and leave them soaking in a container of Alcavis so I can use them over and over.

Dialysis is bad enough as it is without these small miseries.

[Desert Dancer]

Desert, I find it VERY confusing about you blood lines. That is one thing that NxStage really does right. The Arterial line clamp is RED and the Venous line clamp is BLUE. Makes perfect sense, huh?

Yep. The Red/Blue coloring is for sharps and the Green/Yellow is the equivalent for blunts. My old needle sets were NXstage. At least the box said "a NXstage company".

[*kana*]

Why not send this letter to Fresenius?  I've been with Fresenius for 3 years and they have ALWAYS taken my complaints seriously.  If you feel your privacy is being violated then send them a letter/email and they will look into their practice.  I had a complete fit about their Fresenious Billboard trucks pulling up infront of my house.  A couple months later they sent me a letter stating they were painting their trucks and would now be called Tru Blue logistics or something like that.  I feel that it was my complaint and a few others that got them thinking they were violating patients privacy so they had to change before there was a lawsuit against them.  Most medical companies take medical privacy seriously......send them a note.
   

[Hemodoc]

I asked for tape at my DSI/DaVita unit up here in Idaho and they sent me 1 roll of tape for the whole month. The supply issues and cost cutting are getting ridiculous beyond belief.