I feel bad writing this since everyone at the rehab center is very nice but the program is an insurance scam. I’ll pass final judgement when I find out how much they are charging my insurance for each session. Here’s what I do for each session:
- Sign in at the door and pay my insurance co-pay ($25)
- Measure blood sugar
- Attach a wireless EKG transmitter so they can monitor my heart
- Measure blood pressure
- Cardio exercises for 30 minutes, typically walking on a treadmill
- Measure blood pressure again
- 4 minute exercise on a hand pedal machine
- 15 reps of three exercise for each arm on rope machine
- 15 reps of five exercises using free weights
- Measure blood pressure
- Measure blood sugar
That’s it. All they really do is measure my blood pressure three times and watch my heartbeat. Usually there are two nurses and an assistant watching 10-12 people. It’s like a gym except I’m paying by the hour instead of monthly. I would probably stop going and do the exercises at home if UCLA didn’t require me to finish the program to put me back on the active transplant list.
5 down, 19 sessions to go. If I take a week off after my surgery this Friday, then I can finish the program by March 10th. That assumes I go four days a week, including after dialysis on Tuesdays. If I only go three days a week, then I won’t be done until the end of March. UCLA expects me to be done mid to late-March so I can’t slack.
Since I only got a little over an hour of sleep this morning, I’m going to try and take a short nap. I didn’t exert myself too much during rehab and it’s supposed to get a lot warmer outside so I’m going to try and take a walk in the park later this afternoon.
Life with chronic diseases 