A local man is in good health following a double transplant three years ago but now he is struggling with another matter.
The man's financial health is suffering as he tries to keep paying for the medicine to keep him alive.
This appears to be another case of the middle class getting hurt by the system.
People like Rusty Reed, of Versailles, who had a kidney and pancreas transplant three years ago.
He takes 28 pills a day-- and several are very expensive.
RUSTY REED: "They're imunosuppressant medications and the purpose of the drug is to keep me from rejecting the organs because it's a foreign body inside of me."
For three years after the transplant Medicare paid for all these pills-- but as of last month he has to pay his insurance company co-payments.
REED: "These are all the pills I take everyday. People at work call me a drug store because I carry the bag everywhere I go."
Reed says whenever he can he substituted the generic drugs for the brand name drugs. But that only accounts for 2 of the 5 drugs he has to take. Drugs that now will be costing him nearly $12,000 a year.
REED: "That's why I'm at such a loss because I don't make the kind of monies that are going to be required by these medications."
Unfortunately, Reed's wife has cerebral palsy and also needs medications. Some have said if he divorces her, he could go on Medicaid.
REED: "If I were to turn everything we own over to my wife and then not work I would be eligible for public assistance. BUT YOU DON'T WANT TO DO THAT? No I've been married for 25 years."
A member of Ohio's Transplant Coalition tells me there are thousands of people in the same boat as Reed-- and he knows of several who have divorced so they'd qualify for state assistance to pay for their medications.
Reed also has a daughter with medical problems and he's going to explore moving to different states to see if he can get more benefits elsewhere.
