Aetna can suck it too

Funny story, the caduceus pictured above in the hand of Hermes - god of trickters, thieves and commerce - is occasionally confused with the rod of Asclepius, which represents medicine.
It's simply impossible to figure out why.

I've been trying to deal with Aetna, and the frustration is palpable. I've made the terrible error of signing up for the HMO my company offers. No I don't know why. It was a mistake. Leave me alone.

I wish someone had caught me. I was looking at the deductible for the pharmacy visits which is marginally less on the HMO than the PPO. I didn't realize that an HMO requires a referral from a primary caregiver for any non-emergency trip to a specialist. So I'm late in getting round to this, but frankly in the last 10 years of my life my endocrinologist hasn't really done much for me except to prescribe insulin and hassle me.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand. I called Aetna to see if they'd waive the referral for me since they've covered my diabetes for the 8 years I was at Consumer Reports. I surmise that demanding a referral is a safety measure for them so that people don't abuse access to specialists for crazy reasons. If that's the case (maybe it's not?) then as long as I can demonstrate to Aetna that I'm not just making this whole diabetes thing up, they can save money and I can save money and time by waiving this referral necessity one time.

No. No they most certainly cannot. I called and got nowhere with a customer service rep who clearly had as much latitude to make executive decisions about, you know, customer service as I do about Pakistani parliamentary procedure. I asked to talk to her boss and got this wonderful dialog out of her (paraphrased from poor memory, but the gist is right):

Me: So it saves money for me and you both if you can waive this referral. If you look at your records it'll show you that you've been paying for my diabetes treatment for years.

Her: Yes, but it's a new company and a new policy.

Me: Yes, of course, but do you think I was making up the diabetes at the other job for almost a decade?

Her: No sir (she did seem apologetic), but those are the rules.

Me: So, am I just a rule-bound number in your database or a real person with medical needs?

Her: (pause . . .) Yes. Those are the rules.

It must be nice to be in a business where your "customers" can't go anywhere and your clients' representatives don't really care how you treat their employees. At this point I'd vote for a candidate who would just legislate that health insurers have to do a passable job being sensible human beings - or perhaps letting their employees be sensible human beings.