Financial Facts About Health Insurance

This is a page you should read and understand before any other pages on this site.

First, please consider a couple basic understandings:

Insurance exists for the individual to cover the expensive, not generally expected medical events that under normal circumstances can not be handled "out of pocket".

If we were to compare it to your car insurance, you have that insurance to cover the "wreck" to your car or it's loss due to things like fire, flood, being stolen, etc.

You do not insure your car for essentially routine maintenance such as oil changes; spark plug changes, etc.

And so in health insurance, you have it to cover the major disasters first and then you look at the numbers and probabilities of those events happening.

First, A Look at Doctor Visits

While it's convenient to have "doctor visits" covered, this is really not "insurance" It is essentially a pre pay arrangement with some pre pay discounts added in. Most policies offer this because it's what people want and insist on having, and it's quite profitable for the insurance company. If you choose this benefit, particularly on an unlimited basis, you are essentially paying all your insurance year for this special discount. You pay the insurance company every month for this, but statistics show the average person only goes to see a doctor 2.2 times a year... yet with this inclusion, you pay 12 times a year.

Ask me or any other agent to do the math for you.

If you know you go to the doctor monthly or more often, then the benefit may be worth having, but generally the cost of this benefit is more than the savings on one visit when you use your in network doctor.

A Look At Hospital Costs

The average person like a low deductible, and in most cases the deductible applies primarily to hospitalized medical events. Most policies that have a doctor provision as above do not require the payment of the deductible prior to receiving the benefit, and again, most plans allow for the coverage of generic prescriptions without deductible being met. Over 90% of prescriptions written today do have a generic equivalent.

It' is true that some people will require a hospitalization for a non critical situation such as an appendectomy, or a non critical illness, or a non critical surgery such as a knee replacement. Many surgeries that are non critical are performed on an outpatient basis, but look at these statistics:

The Intelligent Way To Purchase Health Insurance

Knowing what you just learned, please consider this as an option and the way to reduce your expenses: Increase your deductible, generally to $5000 or more. If you compare the cost to you between a more popular $2500 deductible and the $5000, you will be surprised how much it is. Often well over $100 a month. Now looking at these stats, Add in first a critical illness policy that will not only cover your deductilble but more importantly, give you some "breathing cash". You must really consider this: Your health insurance plan will probably insure your medical expenses get covered, but if you have a critical illness, or accident.. ask yourself: Will I be out of work or income earning time, and if so, what provides my cash flow? For most people, they are NOT thinking of this when they think of medical insurance! But adding a CI policy covers that deductible AND can provide cash, and all this most often for less than the cost differential.

The same is true of an accident. Add a very inexpensive accident policy! They pay first dollar and your deductible is covered.

It takes a new way of thinking, but when you do it, you'l be much better covered.

As your professional agent and full service brokerage firm, we can do this and even though it may mean you are spending less, our eye is NOT on our commissions, but to help.. and keep you... a long time.