Good morning ladies, I was wondering if anyone would share their stories with me on your private insurance i have no idea which way to go on this. My husband has severe psoriasis and we have been paying outta pocket for derm appt and meds etc. Well he needs to get the injections which are 1500 a shot which he has to take one a month, we of course cant afford this but i cant see my husband suffer anymore. Bc he already has this condition will it be harder for him to get insurance coverage? Does anyones insurance cover derm appts? Any info would be helpful thank you
K. in Texas
Until the new health care bills goes into full affect in 2014 (assuming it does not get overturned), if he can find someone who will cover his pre-existing condition it will be very very expensive. This is the very type of unfair issue this new health care bill was meant to fix. Does he qualify for Gov. insurance like medicare or cade?
I'm an insurance agent in AZ. You can't really compare your needs to what anyone else has. If you have a "preexisting condition", depending on what it is, the insurance company can either decline, exclude or rate up for it. The only way to really know is to contact an independent insurance agent in your area that can do a "prescreen" with all the insurance companies to let you know what they can do, if anything. Good luck.
I have had private health insurance for five years. It works for us, but I don't think it would work for everyone. I can use my insurance with any doctor I need to, so yes, you can see a dermatologist. The issue is going to be with his pre-existing condition. With my insurance, they will not cover ANYTHING to do with my pre-existing condition. It all comes out of my pocket. Fortunately my "condition" doesn't really affect me or my health and the cost to me is minimal. Private insurance is still the best option for me. My experience is that private insurance is not the route to go when you have a pre-existing condition that requires constant medical help.
They may give you an extremely high deductible on that condition. For instance, you might choose a $500 deductibel, but they will put a $2000 deductible on anything dealing with that particular condition. That's private insurance for ya! The best thing would be to get on a group policy through an employer. They are much more likely to treat preexisting conditions. Obviously it isn;t available at your husbands job or he would already have it. What you can do is get a part time job at Starbucks. They offer health insurance even to part time employees. It will be expensive and probably eat your whole check, but at least your family would have health insurance. Or maybe he could find a job with a company that offers health insurance. Even if he took a pay cut, the cost of health care might be more now that the pay cut would be.
I use Medica private insurance, but when I first got it, they added $65/month just because one time I had a mole removed that had "abnormal" cells. After three years of paying premiums, they put me on a lower premium coverage, but with a $6000 annual deductible...
Does your state have any "high risk" insurance? I would check for state or fed government programs that might help you.
If you have access to group insurance through yours or your husband's job, go through that! Avoid private insurance at all costs!! My husband is self-employed and it is extremely difficult to find affordable and good coverage. We have a DECENT policy now through Anthem, their rates are the best I could find. We recently (w/in the last 6 months) switched from Aetna. I cannot say enough BAD things about Aetna. They raise rates for anything (a one-time non antibiotic med, turning 30-GASP!) and if you have any questions, your call gets directed to a call center in India w/operators who speak minimal English. Every time I would make a phone call to Aetna, I would be on the phone for a minimum of 1.5 hrs to get my question resolved. It got to the point that it was easier to just pay it than it was to call (which is exactly what they want you to do). So far with Anthem, they have paid everything they're supposed to pay and I always talk to English speaking Americans when I call. The only experience that I have with pre-existing conditions is w/my stepson and his ADHD. We ended up putting him on his mother's group insurance because although they did cover him, his meds drove our premium up to the point that we could no longer afford it.
Private insurance looks for absolutely any reason to turn you down and this one would be an issue for sure. I got turned down for an eye condition that costs nothing other than one ophthalmologist visit a year. I agree with Jen in that if you can find a place willing to cover him, it will cost a fortune.
Until the government plan eliminates discrimination, you're stuck. The best bet is to get a job offering a group medical plan. Those don't screen for health issues.
