Corporations maybe aren't so bad

Valerie over at The dLife recently posted about her positive experiences with Medtronic, which reminded me that I've been meaning to post about my experiences with them as well.

In the ten months that I've been using my insulin pump, I have very rarely needed to contact Medtronic. But, when I have, their customer service has always been EXCELLENT.

I recently let them know that I've had some issues with my pump tubing not wanting to fill sometimes. They listened and sent me replacements.

Not too long ago I also checked up on exactly how many test strips a day I was getting, and was unpleasantly surprised to hear that they didn't have my most recent script from my endo. They took care of all of it.

I recently placed what will be my last order on this side of the Atlantic. That customer service rep was so incredibly helpful, letting me know that my insurance company actually considered a 90 day supply to be four boxes of infusion sets and reservoirs rather than the three I'd been ordering. She also answered several questions I had about what exactly my insurance might pay for as my plan is soon expiring. We got the order set up with a future ship date, and now I don't have to worry about anything.

My latest interaction with them happened while I was at home in MO for five days. I learned from my trip to Italy, when I barely had enough infusion sets to cover a kinked cannula and bad tubing. This time, I took four sets, even though I only needed two. And thank goodness I did!

My pump alarm woke me up on that Sunday night, two days before I was supposed to head back to Philadelphia. I had just changed my set that evening before bed (my second and (should have been my) last change before going home). I got an alarm I had never seen before: MOTOR ERROR. I tried to clear out the alert without really dealing with it, only to get another weird series of vibrations. I finally turned on the light, put on my glasses, and saw that I needed to actually reprime the pump. So I did.

I also noticed I was abnormally high, especially after the correction I'd given myself post-site change and pre-bed. I bolused to correct the 164, and went back to bed.

When I woke up, I was in the 130s. Weird. I corrected and dosed for coffee and an English muffin. And then I rode high for the next several hours. I didn't think much of it. I was sleeping at a different house every night, dashing all over town visiting all sorts of people. Numbers will be high.

I finally got back to my parents' house in the afternoon and started doing some googling. Apparently, a motor error can be bad. Can mess up the pump's reading of what doses it gives you. Can give you too much or too little insulin.

Obviously, I wasn't getting enough. So I called Medtronic.

The woman I spoke with was EXTREMELY helpful. We ran diagnostics on my pump using a spare infusion set and tubing. She asked lots of questions. She even told me how Medtronic has their employees wear a pump during their training so they can better empathize with the people they talk to on the phone everyday.

Everything ended up being fine, but now that I had pulled my site and used a set for diagnostics, I was down to my last set. I was leaving the next day, but I was a bit nervous that I'd have a tubing issue or a kinked cannula.

Fortunately, nothing like that happened. Despite several delays on my flights home, I got back to Philadelphia with no other pump issues and everything has worked fine since. And, Medtronic is sending me two infusion sets and reservoirs to make up for the ones I went through to fix the issue.

I'm really grateful for a company that seems to genuinely care about their customers, who doesn't make me do the dirty work to make sure all is well with my insurance, my pump, and my prescriptions. And you can imagine that I'm pleased with them that in Italy they have my exact pump and CGM system, making this swiftly approaching transition to Italian life just that much easier.

I'm sure that my experience is not universal and that this company has flaws. Nevertheless, I'm grateful that I've seen this side of them. I'm one happy customer!

Disclaimer: Medtronic doesn't know I blog, doesn't care that I do, and doesn't give me anything for free that they wouldn't give to their other customers. This is just my experience and my opinion!