What a week!

This week was a whirlwind.  It started on Monday (rather than Sunday as some people start the week) with the purchase of our new personnel carrier, a Toyota Sienna van with a Freedom Motors rear ramp.  We chose this van because it has a nice wide aisle between the middle row seats.  This is important because, in theory, Aaron could park his wheelchair right between the seats and have a nice view.  Who wants to be stuck in the back?

The middle row seats are comfortable enough for sitting in.  Some others we tried did not seem intended for human occupants (maybe gerbils).   Siennas have an excellent track record and drive well.  In fact we all agree it drives better than my car.

Cheryl deserves much praise for this purchase.  She worked for months with dealers, researching online and test-driving.  Hundreds of her hours were poured into this.  My big take-away: salespeople will offer what they want to sell you, not what you need.  They'll sell you things that don't exist.  They'll bait and switch.  Do you think that because we're buying this out of medical necessity they'd be compassionate and helpful?  Guess again.

We worked directly with a "conversion" manufacturer.  On the Friday previous, we toured the factory.  We talked to the lead engineer.  We poked and prodded and investigated the entire process.  They had dozens of car on the factory floor, all in different states of modification.  That was neat.  They spent 3 and half hours with us in the factory and giant indoor showroom.

We paid thousands of dollars less and got a better vehicle in the end.  They didn't try to tell us we wanted a different vehicle.  They didn't up-sell us, they didn't try to sell us add-ons.  They understood the vehicles and the chairs.  The sales guy drove out to Ann Arbor from Battle Creek to bring us the van and close with us at the bank.  If you need a wheelchair accessible vehicle, try Freedom Motors.

Thank you to those who very generously donated a total of $10k toward the purchase of this van.  We also got $3k from Michigan (this process took over 80 hours!).  We love our new van.  We feel free to go wherever we want, when we want.  We still owe the bank $10k, so if you're in the market for helping out a family in need, this is a great chance!  We're planning to post on the blog who donated toward what for Aaron.  If you'd like to be mentioned let us know.  I'm going to err on the side of your privacy unless you say otherwise.

Aaron's 'loaner'

On Tuesday, the very next day, we went to MDA because they had a "loaner" wheelchair for us.  It's an Invacare TDX3.  It's a bucket of bolts that barely works, goes skidding off randomly and weighs 300 pounds (it really does!).  For now though it's much better than the power-assist manual chair he had borrowed.  His arms are no longer bleeding, thanks to the MDA!  That chair was a huge step up from not being able to do anything, so we're heading in the right direction.

Like car salespeople though (yes sales-women are included!), wheelchair dealers are an unscrupulous lot.  They'll sell you whatever brand they have an exclusionary contract with.  These contracts should be illegal!  An Invacare dealer won't advertise they only deal in a single brand, they'll just tell you it's the best for whatever reason they think will work on you.  You better do your homework!

So we're in the middle of another couple hundred hours of research.  This is getting old.  What we really want is something like the Permobil Street.  Think about being a kid and having to choose a wheelchair. You have choice A) "Invacare", the name makes me gag.  It's hard to get past it. Choice B) The Permobil Street CORPUS has a picture of a dude getting a tattoo while sitting in chair decked-out in flame decals.  The Street goes 7.5 Mph, which is a little bit faster than an angry mom.  It goes through grass and mud and sisters and hills and restaurants.

In the comparison below, ignore the seat itself.  Focus on the base.  Which is built for going places?  It might be the one with headlamps and pneumatic tires, and flames!

Invacare TDX:  Nursing home edition.

Permobil Street: Baddass included.

Here's the rub.  Insurance will pay the price if the Street were an indoor-only type chair, but because it can be used outdoors safely and comfortably, they claim it is not "as" medically-necessary and limit the coverage.  This was a fun process to discover.  They claim to cover 100% of the chair, but the funny thing about 100% is that they cover 100% of what they want to cover.  They don't tell you how much that is either.  You have to get the dealer to tell you how much they want to charge.  Then after you buy it, you get to find out how much it's going to cost you and whether the insurance company decides to cover it at all.  I have a "gold" PPO plan with Blue Cross, Blue Shield, one of the best plans available.

So if you want to have a life, you're going to pay.  If you want to sit inside then you're totally covered.  The chairs cost the same.  I don't understand the reasoning.  Maybe they think people are going to game the system and play bumper-chairs in the parking lot with $20,000 wheel chairs.  Maybe people who want to go outside are libertarians.  Can you imagine amputees in Florida driving the chair on the right to the VA because they can't afford transportation, but they get a chair like that.  Why not give them something they can USE?  Our healthcare system folks.  It's run by economists, not health practitioners.

We have a dealer we've been working with that has no contract with either Permobil or Invacare.  He's helping us get a chair.  He's not an expert though in heavy-duty wheelchairs.  The Invacare dealer we know is lacking too and that probably influences how I feel about Invacare.  Invacare has an absolutely horrible web site too, and that strikes at my heart.  So more research is needed for this to end well.  We all "want" the Permobil Street, but does it want us?  Maybe if we're baddass enough... Maybe I'll open a tattoo parlor (with a really good web site).