Lymphedema Compressionwear Garments

For decades, I have been involved with being advocates for women and children through CASA, Eldercare, Williamson County Crisis Center, and National Domestic Violence Hotline, as well as had been a survivor from domestic violence and sexual assault for almost 2 decades.

10 years ago, I was in an auto accident where my knees hit the steering wheel.  From that point in time, my life has forever changed.  A month after the accident, I was diagnosed with Lymphedema (a condition that there is no real cure but affects the fluids that flow through the lymphatic system due to damages done to the lymph nodes.) 

Throughout the 10 year journey, I have gone through many months of treatments (which included compression wrapping with 4 layers of compression wraps, foam padding, cotton padding and stockinettes AND MLD therapy, as well as pumping on the compression pump devices).  Most of the time I didn't have health insurance because I was the type of a single parent mother that would be working 2-3 jobs to make ends meet, mostly in the legal and/or advocacy areas.   Because I was, at least, working at the time, I was able to figure out a way to cover the costs of the compression wear garments (JOBST, SOLARIS, CIRCAID, and FARROW were some of the garments I was able to get throughout the years, although I often had to wear them beyond the recommended wear  (6 months to a year), wearing them for as much as 2 years at a time.  

I lost my job in 2012 and the lymphedema has decreased my mobility to get around, so much so that I have had to get on disability.   The downside of being on disabiity is the being put on medicare for the insurance plan.

Why this is a downside is that medicare has no category for compression wear garments.  The Lymphedema Treatment Act (http://lymphedematreatmentact.org) is designed to change that, but at this time the law is still looking for co-sponsors in the House side of Congress (so far it has 91 bipartisan cosponsors and 4 lead sponsors).  It's one of those type of oversight things which should make it easier for this bill to be passed.  It all just takes time.

In the meantime, I need to get some compression wear garments to wear to help maintain the extra work I have been doing with the treatments throughout this, pumping at home, and wrapping them at home.  In order to do that I need roughly $1000 for each garment that covers my full legs.  While garments are good for 6 months to a year generally, I really should be wearing 2 (one of the daytime and one for the nighttime wear) to extend the life of the compression wear garments.  

To increase my mobility I have a donated electric powerchair and a donated power lift to lift it on the back of the car, but I don't have a towing hitch -- and the estimated costs to get the towing hitch on the SUV, the power box hooked up, and the whole lift hooked in together is around $500-700 from Austin Mobility.