With the rising cost of medical treatment, it makes a lot of sense to have some type of health coverage, regardless of age and status in life. When shopping for health insurance, it’s important to know a few important things about it first.
Types of Health Insurance Plans
Contrary to what some people think, there are actually many different types of health insurance plans. These insurance plans involve in some way the current state of health of those being covered.
Medical Plans
These are the health care plans that most people are familiar with. This type of plan helps pay for the costs of medical checkups and treatments should you become injured or sick. These plans usually come with a deductible, or an initial amount not covered by the insurance company. Once the health care costs exceeds the deductible amount, the insurance company typically pays all or most of the subsequent costs, or at least up to a certain amount.
Prescription Plans
Paying for some medicines can make up a very large chunk of medical expenses. A Prescription plan can be for the medicine needed for short-term illnesses or for medications taken regularly. Usually the amount paid personally depends on the type of medicine needed.
Vision Plans
It’s amazing how relatively few people think about getting a health insurance plan like this. After all, 61% of all people wear glasses or contact lenses. Among older people, those who don’t need eyeglasses are rather very uncommon.
With this type of insurance, eyeglasses or contact lenses cost less than full price. Usually, eye exam fees are also reduced.
Dental Plans
Surprisingly, some people think oral care is different from general health care. In fact, going to the dentist is crucial for overall health. With dental insurance, out of pocket expenses for checkups and treatments are reduced. The plan may cover some of the costs of dental checkups, tooth removal and replacement, gum disease treatment, and possibly even braces. Many plans allow two free or reduced cost checkup and cleans per year.
Health Spending Plans
This type of plan allows those covered to take money from their paycheck directly into an account reserved for medical and dental care. Usually, this money is pretax, which means that portion of your salary is untaxed, and it is reserved only for paying health costs.
Medical and dental bills can be reimbursed from that account. In some cases, a debit card attached to that account can be used to pay for allowed health care expenses. Obviously, money goes into the account each month on payday, and the expenses are deducted from the health spending account as needed.
Disability Plans
When someone becomes disabled, they and their family lose money due to the inability to work. A disability health plan provides for financial compensation should the covered person be off work due to injury or illness. It is important to read the fine print in any case, but especially so in the case of disability plans.
Life Insurance
This insurance plan makes sure that families gets monetary compensation if the covered person passes away. That means the family doesn’t feel the loss of the paycheck as well as the death. In some cases, this type of plan can be offered by employers, but the plan expires on change employment.
By understanding all thesetypes of health insurance plans, it should be easier to determine which type will better suit a particular situation. Medical Plans are a must-have insurance plan, but the others may make sense too.
