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Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Diamonds, Gold, & EleCare

So here is the toddler formula that Derek's doctor has prescribed for him to help him gain weight. (It is a a completely broken-down, hypoallergenic formula)

For a quick recap...
Derek + milk= Very bad
Derek + peanuts= Very bad (at least according to the tests, he's never actually had them)
Derek + eggs= Very bad (ditto as peanuts)
Derek + oats/wheat/barley= questionable

Despite all of those allergies, there are still foods for him to eat, however Derek does not like to eat. Not sure why-- we're working on a diagnosis, possibly reflux-related, but suffice it to say that there have been days when he has barely eaten a thing. Thus, no weight gain for a long time. He still looks relatively normal since he was a gargantuan sized baby and had rolls enough to live off of for awhile.
Anyway, his doctor wants this EleCare to be his primary source of nutrition until we can get him eating again. We turned in paperwork to Tricare, the military insurance company, and waited and hoped that they would help pay for the formula, as we'd heard it was crazy expensive.
They did!! What a blessing!
It was even more of a blessing than we thought, because when we went to pick up a month's supply, we had some serious sticker-shock!
Here is the shipment we received-- 2 cases with 6 cans each, plus 3 additional cans to make a total of 15 cans of formula

Here is the price tag!
You can click on the picture to see it clearly...if you have trouble believing that price.

Wow, let's break that down--

15 cans costs $928.68, which means 1 can is $61.92. 1 can lasts us for about 2 days, meaning that each sippy full of formula that Derek drinks costs about $5.00!
What do you have to say about that Derek?

I know!

4 comments:

Annie Pennington said...

WOWZA!!! I'm so glad Tricare is paying that!!! That is some SERIOUSLY steep formula!!! I do hope it helps handsome Mr. Derek!

Oh and from the camera nerd in me...nice bokah (blurry background) on the first two images!! WHOO HOOO!

Keith McDaniel said...

It's like have a Starbucks every 4-6 hours. Insane, but he is TOTALLY worth it. Yea for tricare!!

Rachel said...

Oh...my...GOD!!!! That's un-freakin-believable! I thought the nutramagen stuff was expensive. Gain weight, buckaroo!

Audrey said...

Holy *bleep*! Thank God for Tricare!